SINGLE PARENT FAMILIES: FROM STEREOTYPE TO ARCHETYPE
by
DIANA DIKELEDI MONAMA
submitted in part fulfilment of the requirements for the
degree of
MASTER OF ARTS IN CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY
at the
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AFRICA
SUPERVISOR: PROF F J A SNYDERS
NOVEMBER 2007
i
Student Number: 32345356
I declare that
SINGLE PARENT FAMILIES: FROM STEREOTYPE TO ARCHETYPE
is my own work and that all sources that I have used or
quoted have been indicated and acknowledged by means of
complete references.
Signature: ________________________
(Ms D D Monama)
Date:
__________________________
Acknowledgements
Many persons, too numerous to name influenced directly or
indirectly this dissertation.
ii
•
I am particularly grateful to my supervisor, Prof
F.J.A Snyders, for his patience and invaluable
guidance.
•
A special thanks to my friends for their encouragement
and their belief in me when I felt that I would not be
able to complete the study.
•
To Wilma Burger, the oncology social worker who made
this study possible by recommending participants and
her enthusiasm in the study.
•
Many thanks to my parents for their support throughout
my studies.
•
To my two daughters, Janet and Jane who inspired this
study; their understanding and support when I could
not attend to their needs during the writing of this
work.
•
And finally, to the four widowers who were willing to
share their most sensitive experiences with a
stranger.
SINGLE-PARENT FAMILIES: FROM STEREOTYPE TO ARCHETYPE
SUMMARY
iii
The number of single-parent families has increased
dramatically in the world. In South Africa, this increase
has partly been due to the increased number of deaths as a
result of the AIDS pandemic. The purpose of this study is
to explore experiences of widowers as single parents. The
study proposes to elevate the view of single-parent
families, which classes them as stereotypes of
victimization, to where such families come to represent
responsible archetypes. Unstructured in-depth interviews
were used to obtain data from two Black and two White
widowed single fathers. Thematic content analysis was
utilized to identify emerging themes from the fathers’
stories. Fathers in this study challenged the deficit
model’s view of single parenting which claims that these
families are broken. As far as its applicability is
concerned, this study may be beneficial to
psychotherapists, single parents and society as a whole.
Keywords: Single-parent family, widower, stereotype,
archetype.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Declaration……………………………………………………………………………………………………ii
Acknowledgements………………………………………………………………………………………iii
Summary………………………………………………………………………………………………………………iv
iv
Table of contents……………………………………………………………………………………v
List of figures and tables……………………………………………………………viii
CHAPTER 1…………………………………………………………………………………………………………1
Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………1
Statement of the problem……………………………………………………………2
Design of the study…………………………………………………………………………2
Sampling………………………………………………………………………………………………………3
Data Collection……………………………………………………………………………………3
Data Analysis…………………………………………………………………………………………3
Definition of concepts…………………………………………………………………4
Single-parent families……………………………………………………………4
Widowers…………………………………………………………………………………………………5
Stereotype……………………………………………………………………………………………5
Archetype………………………………………………………………………………………………6
Chapter Outline……………………………………………………………………………………7
CHAPTER 2…………………………………………………………………………………………………………10
Theoretical frame of reference……………………………………………10
Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………10
Anti-realism………………………………………………………………………………………12
Language…………………………………………………………………………………………………16
Culture……………………………………………………………………………………………………18
Power…………………………………………………………………………………………………………22
Locating Social Constructionism
within psychotherapy………………………………………………………………………25
Locating Social Constructionism
within research……………………………………………………………………………………27
Social Constructionism revisited………………………………………30
Moderate (scientific) realism considered…………………32
CHAPTER 3…………………………………………………………………………………………………………36
Literature review………………………………………………………………………………36
Historical overview of literature……………………………………37
Myths and realities of single
parents and their families…………………………………………………38
Role of fathers in parenting……………………………………………46
Moral father…………………………………………………………………………………51
The breadwinner…………………………………………………………………………52
The gender-role model…………………………………………………………53
The new nurturant father…………………………………………………53
Widowers as single parents…………………………………………………57
Sex-role identification…………………………………………………………61
Social isolation and or systemic
embeddedness of single parent families…………………65
Challenges for single parents…………………………………………68
Financial difficulties………………………………………………………69
v
Social interaction/redefinition of role…………70
Single parenting from an ecological
perspective…………………………………………………………………………………………70
Microsystems…………………………………………………………………………………72
Mesosystems……………………………………………………………………………………72
Ecosystems………………………………………………………………………………………72
Macrosystems…………………………………………………………………………………73
Cybernetics of cybernetics view of family
normality……………………………………………………………………………………………………73
CHAPTER 4…………………………………………………………………………………………………………75
Methodology………………………………………………………………………………………………75
Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………75
Qualitative research paradigm………………………………………………76
Social Constructionism…………………………………………………………………78
Sampling………………………………………………………………………………………………………81
Sampling size……………………………………………………………………………………81
Sampling problems…………………………………………………………………………82
Contacting participants………………………………………………………………82
Data collection……………………………………………………………………………………83
Data analysis…………………………………………………………………………………………85
Step 1: Familiarisation and immersion……………………87
Step 2: Inducing themes…………………………………………………………87
Step 3: Coding…………………………………………………………………………………88
Step 4: Elaboration……………………………………………………………………88
Step 5: Interpretation and checking…………………………88
Trustworthiness of qualitative research……………………89
Credibility…………………………………………………………………………………………90
Transferability………………………………………………………………………………91
Dependability……………………………………………………………………………………92
Confirmability…………………………………………………………………………………93
Ethical issues………………………………………………………………………………………94
CHAPTER 5…………………………………………………………………………………………………………97
Interviews…………………………………………………………………………………………………97
Presentation of interviews…………………………………………………97
Genograms……………………………………………………………………………………………………98
An introduction to Mr Mathe……………………………………………………99
Background information……………………………………………………………101
The interview……………………………………………………………………………………101
Themes emerging from Mr Mathe’s interview………………102
Control and helplessness………………………………………………………102
Aiming to be a ‘perfect father and mother’………107
Isolation………………………………………………………………………………………………110
Mr Mathe’s response to the interview summaries…112
Researcher’s reflections on the interviews……………113
An introduction to Marko……………………………………………………………114
vi
Background information……………………………………………………………116
The interview……………………………………………………………………………………117
Themes emerging from Marko’s interview………………………118
Responsibility…………………………………………………………………………………118
Keeping things the same…………………………………………………………122
Connectedness and isolation………………………………………………124
Marko’s response to the interview summaries…………126
Researcher’s reflections on the interviews……………126
An introduction to Matt………………………………………………………………127
Background information…………………………………………………………129
The interview…………………………………………………………………………………129
Themes emerging from Matt’s interview…………………………130
Helplessness………………………………………………………………………………………130
Isolation and support………………………………………………………………132
Time available versus time needed………………………………134
Matt’s response to the interview summaries……………137
Researcher’s reflections on the interviews……………137
An introduction to Mandla…………………………………………………………137
Background information……………………………………………………………139
The interview……………………………………………………………………………………140
Themes emerging from Mandla’s interview……………………141
Disbelief………………………………………………………………………………………………141
Protection……………………………………………………………………………………………143
Closeness and distance……………………………………………………………147
Mandla’s response to the interview summaries………150
Summaries of the four interviews………………………………………151
Adjustment to loss and loneliness………………………………151
Being the best parent………………………………………………………………156
Routines and rituals…………………………………………………………………161
CHAPTER 6…………………………………………………………………………………………………………164
Conclusions and implications…………………………………………………164
Summaries of the participants’ meta-themes……………166
Implications for single-parents…………………………………………171
Implications for psychotherapists……………………………………173
Limitations of the study……………………………………………………………174
Reflections of the researcher………………………………………………174
Suggestions for further research………………………………………176
REFERENCES………………………………………………………………………………………………………179
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES
vii
PARTICIPANTS’ GENOGRAMS
Figure
Figure
Figure
Figure
Figure
Figure
Figure
Figure
1:
2:
3:
4:
5:
6:
7:
8:
Before Mrs Mathe’s death………………………………………100
After Mrs Mathe’s death…………………………………………100
Before Corrie’s death………………………………………………115
After Corrie’s death…………………………………………………116
Before Kimberly’s death…………………………………………128
After Kimberly’s death……………………………………………128
Before Thato’s death…………………………………………………138
After Thato’s death……………………………………………………139
Table 1: Themes co-occurring across
and within interviews…………………………………………………164
viii
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Families are the social units which are held primarily
responsible for the procreation, nurturance, and
socialisation of children. Because families serve these
vital social functions, the family as a microcosm of
society has been the focus of a great deal of attention
(Mendes, 1975). Partaking of social stereotypes around
single-parent families, studies of these families have been
based on the pathological (deficit) model of single parentfamilies which claims that such families are broken,
deviant, and dysfunctional (Javo, Ronning, Heyerdahl &
Rudmin, 2004; Snyman, 1993). This author hopes to destigmatize single parents in general, and single fathers in
particular. It is also hoped that this study will help
professionals working with single men who are trying to
raise children on their own and be the best parents for
their children.
There has been a shift from the traditional two-parent
family to more diverse forms of family structures (Dowd,
1997); therefore, an understanding of single- parent
1
families is essential. Although an increasing number of
people are choosing to raise children on their own, parents
may become single parents through death or divorce. Parents
who find themselves parenting their children on their own
after the death of a spouse are faced with the numerous
challenges of lone parenting at a time when they are going
through their own trauma.
Statement of the problem
The present study is an exploratory one, aimed at
achieving a preliminary understanding of single parentfamilies. The focus is on how the family functions as a
unit in the absence of one parent, namely the mother. The
unit of analysis is the widowed father, who has a child or
children under 18 at the time of the interview.
Design of the study
In order to gather in-depth information and
descriptions regarding the experiences of widowed fathers
as single parents, a method that allowed more probing and
flexibility was chosen. Qualitative research methodology
using thematic content analysis was used to explore the
2
experiences of widowed single fathers. This approach allows
for the fathers to tell their stories, and in the process,
to co-construct their realities with the researcher. The
themes that will emerge from this study will hopefully
provide participants with an enriched understanding of the
process they find themselves going through.
Sampling
Sampling will be purposive. The sample will consist of
2 Black widowers and 2 White widowers who have children
below the age of 18 years, who stay with the fathers, fulltime.
Data Collection
Unstructured interviews will be used to gather
information from the participants.
Data Analysis
The interviews will be audio-taped and then
transcribed. Thematic content analysis will be undertaken.
The transcribed interview summaries will be sent to the
3
participants to ensure the accuracy of interpretation
reflected in interviews.
Definition of concepts
There are several concepts which provide a lens
through which this study is viewed. The concepts which will
be defined include: Single-parent families, widowers,
stereotype, and archetype.
Single-parent families
According to (www.answers.com), single-parent families
are families with children under the age of 18, headed by a
parent who is widowed or divorced and has not remarried, or
by a parent who has never married.
Single parent families
are a common variant of nuclear families. In this study,
‘single’ will be used interchangeably with ‘lone’ and
‘sole’, which means alone.
4
Widowers
The South African Pocket Oxford Dictionary (1993)
defines a widower as a man who has lost his wife by death
and who has not married again.
Stereotype
According to (en.wikipedia.org), stereotypes are
ideas held by some individuals about members of
particular groups, based solely on membership of that
group. They are often used in a negative or
prejudicial sense and are frequently used to justify
certain discriminatory behaviours. A stereotype is
often a negative caricature or inversion of some
positive characteristic possessed by members of a
group, exaggerated to the point where it becomes
repulsive or ridiculous. Stereotype production is
based on:
•
Generalization
•
Exaggerations or distortions
•
Presentation of cultural attributes as being
natural.
•
Simplification
5
(www.media-awareness.ca) asserts that stereotypes,
exaggerations or distortions are as old as human culture
itself. Stereotypes reflect ideas which groups of people
hold about others who are different from them. Stereotypes
ignore the uniqueness of individuals by painting all
members of a group with the same brush.
Archetype
The Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary (2000) defines
an archetype as the most typical or perfect example of a
particular type of person or thing. (www.answers.com)
defines an archetype as an idealized model of a person,
object, or concept from which similar instances are
derived, copied, or emulated. The term was adopted by
literary critics from the writings of psychologist Carl
Jung, who formulated a theory of the collective unconscious
(www.britannica.com). Jungian archetype is a thought
pattern that finds worldwide parallels, either in cultures
or in individuals.
6
Chapter Outline
This study consists of a theoretical component which
includes a theoretical frame of reference and a literature
review. The practical component includes the methodology
section, the interviews, and the analysis and conclusion.
The review of related literature in this study
provides a backdrop against which single parents in general
and widowers in particular are perceived. An exploration of
the existing knowledge on single parents, the role of
fathers in parenting, widowers as single parents, and the
challenges facing single parents is undertaken. This
dissertation on single parenting from a non deficit model
perspective is a pioneering study in a field where there
has been little documented research in this country.
The purpose of the practical component is to provide
four widowed fathers with an opportunity to tell their
stories and relate their experiences as single parents.
Themes emerging from these stories will be explored and
discussed.
7
The following chapters are included:
Chapter 1 offers an introduction to the study with
definition of main concepts. The statement of the problem
and the research design are described, and an outline of
the chapters is provided. Chapter 2 discusses the
theoretical frame of reference that informed the study,
namely Social Constructionism.
Chapter 3 examines related literature. This will be
followed by an examination of single parents from an
ecological perspective. The view of normality from a
second-order cybernetics perspective will also be
discussed.
Chapter 4 consists of a comprehensive explanation of
the research methodology used in this study, namely the
qualitative approach. Thematic data analysis methods are
discussed.
Chapter 5 contains the researcher’s narrative of each
widower’s story. Emerging themes are then discussed. The
8
common themes found in all four of the participants’
narratives are also evaluated.
Chapter 6 offers a conclusion and analyzes the
implications of the research findings. Thereafter, the
researcher’s reflections concerning the research process
will be provided.
9
CHAPTER 2
THEORETICAL FRAME OF REFERENCE
It is an unfortunate misunderstanding (a legacy of
rationalism) to think that truth can only be the truth
that is composed of universal moments; that the truth
of a situation is precisely that which is repeatable
and constant in it.(Bakhtin, in Shotter and
Billig, 1998, p. 13).
Introduction
This chapter aims to explain the epistemological and
theoretical positions that have influenced the
conceptualization of this study. The views held by the
deficit models of single parenting claim that single-parent
families are deviant, and these models draw sharp
differences between functional two-parent families and
‘deviant’ single parent families.
The origins of Social Constructionism are diverse and
fragmented, as one would expect from an evolving zeitgeist
(Wick, 1996). It is a development of an earlier branch of
10
sociology, instigated by Marx and Mannheim, called the
sociology of knowledge (Owen, 1992). Marx once wrote that
“Social existence determines man’s consciousness” and this
phrase formed the basis of Social Constructionism (Berger &
Luckman, 1966, p. 17).
There is no single definition of the concept and no
one feature that could be said to identify it. One should
rather view it as a mode of thinking. Burr (1995) states
that different constructionist theorists may share some
characteristics with each other, but that there is really
nothing that they all have in common.
Social Constructionism encompasses various positions
which all share a common epistemological scepticism about
the nature of ‘facts’. It is defined as an approach to
psychology and other bodies of knowledge that focuses on
meaning and power, and its
aim is to account for ways in
which phenomena are socially constructed (Michael, 2006).
The following are some of the basic tenets of Social
Constructionism:
11
Anti-realism
Social Constructionism views discourse about the
world, not as a reflection or map of the world but as an
artifact of communal exchange (Gergen, 1985, p. 266).
Social Constructionism insists that we take a critical
stance towards our taken-for-granted ways of understanding
the world (Berger & Luckman, 1966; Burr, 1995; Gergen,
1985).
The everyday, taken-for-granted world is one that
originates in the thoughts and actions of society and is
maintained as real by the inhabitants of that society
(Berger & Luckman, 1966). Social Constructionism invites us
to be critical and to challenge the view that conventional
knowledge is based upon objective, unbiased observation of
the world (Gergen, 1985).
Everyday life presents itself as a reality interpreted
by man and subjectively meaningful to them as a coherent
whole (Berger & Luckman, 1966). According to Burr (1995),
knowledge is sustained by social processes, and knowledge
of the world is not derived from the nature of the world
12
but is constructed between people. Burr (1995, p. 4)
states:
It is through the daily interactions between people
in the course of social
life that our versions of
knowledge becomes fabricated. Therefore, social
interaction of all kinds, and particularly language,
is of great interest to social
constructionists.
A social constructionist perspective provides us with
the means of confronting claims to knowledge with the
question: ‘Could it be otherwise?’ (Shotter, 1993, p. 35).
Bhaskar in Shotter (1993, p. 35) points out the following
with regard to his own transcendental realism:
It entails the acceptance of (1) the principle of
epistemic relativity, which states that all beliefs
are socially produced, so that all knowledge is
transient, and neither truth-values nor criteria of
rationality exists outside historical time. But it
entails the rejection of (2) the doctrine of
judgmental (or moral) relativity, which maintains that
all beliefs are equally valid, in the sense that there
can be no rational grounds for preferring one to
13
another.
Shotter (1993) explains further by saying that although the
postmodern self may be something of a mosaic, no self is
completely an island. One occupies a multiplicity of
standpoints, each within at least a local community, and
within such communities there are standards, ways of
judging, to which one must conform if one is to be counted
as a member. However, this does not mean that it is only
the standards within one’s own ‘clan’ which count. Along
with one’s own ways of judging, one can ask: ‘Could they be
otherwise?’; ‘what other ways of judging might be
possible?’ (Shotter, 1993, p. 35).
Burr (1995) states that what we regard as ‘truth’ is
not the product of an objective observation of the world,
but rather of the social processes and interactions in
which people are constantly engaged with each other. Berger
and Luckman (1966, p. 17) capture the notion of reality in
this observation: “Pascal’s famous statement is that what
is truth on one side of the Pyrenees is error on the
other”. Gergen (1985, p. 268) says that:
The degree to which a given form of understanding
14
prevails or is sustained across time is not
fundamentally dependent on the empirical validity
of the perspective in question, but on the
vicissitudes of Social
processes.
Knowledge and social action go together (Burr, 1995).
These negotiated understandings could take a wide variety
of different forms; therefore, we talk of numerous possible
social constructions of the world, with each construction
bringing with it a different kind of action from human
beings (Burr, 1995, p. 5). Descriptions or constructions of
the world sustain some patterns of social action and
exclude others (Burr, 1995).
Goodman in Phipps (2004), supports Anderson and
Goolishian’s (1992) notion that the conceptualization of
reality as a multiverse of meanings created in dynamic
social
exchange and conversation moves us away from
concerns about issues of unique truths and into a
multiverse that includes a diversity of conflicting
versions of the world (p.321). Within this framework, there
are no ‘real’ external entities, only communicating and
languaging individuals. Therefore there are no ‘facts’ to
15
be known, systems to be ‘understood’, and no patterns and
regularities to be ‘discovered’ (Phipps, 2004, p. 322).
Truly objective knowledge is, and always has been, a
figment of our imagination and terms like reality and
objectivity should be put in quotation marks (Maturana in
Efran et al, 1990).
Language
Language is considered to be the medium through which
real knowledge can be accessed (Walters, 1998). According
to Shotter and Billig (1998, p. 13), language lives only in
the dialogic interaction of those who make use of it. It
always creates something that never existed before,
something absolutely new and unrepeatable (p.13). Berger
and Luckman (1966) argue that language provides us with
ready-made possibilities for the ongoing objectification of
our unfolding experience. They assert that:
Language is pliantly expansive so as to allow me to
objectify a great variety of experiences coming my
way in the course of my life. Language also typifies
experiences, for the typified experience can, in
principle, be duplicated by anyone falling into the
16
category in question ( Berger & Luckman, 1996, p. 53).
Maturana in Phipps (2004, p. 323) says that “language
is for humans what grooming is for chimps”. It creates and
maintains social order. Efran, Lukens and Lukens (1990, p.
32) claim that “it is in language that meanings are
created”. To apprehend the world as a unified whole, we
first have to use language to divide it into a series of
separate, definable objects and events. The objectivist
believes that our conceptual distinctions yield
increasingly accurate and sophisticated understanding of
the outside world as it actually exists (Efran, Lukens &
Lukens, 1990).
Burr (1995) maintains that concepts are arbitrary
divisions and categorizations of our experience. We have
divided our world into things. Maturana in Efran et al
(1990) reminds us that even our most elegant ‘maps’ of the
universe are constrained by our biology, and that we see
the world only in terms of ourselves. What we think we know
about the world is always determined by the exigencies of
our own situation (Efran et al, 1990, p. 32).
Language is
seen as a self-referential system (Derrida in Burr, 1995).
Wittgenstein in Shotter (1993, p. 78) asks:
17
So you are saying that human agreement decides what is
true and what is false? … It is what human beings say
that is true and false; and they agree in the language
they use.
Shotter (1993, p. 40) adds that words only become
one’s own when others addressed by one’s utterances are
prepared to listen to them, and to hear in them one’s own
accent or tone, one’s own semantic and expressive
intentions, the ‘shaping’ one gives to words that is
expressive of one’s own being. Shotter (1993) further
contends that language as a ‘tool’ extends our capacities
to act, to ‘move’ others, and ourselves, while the
‘prosthetic’ function of language extends our perceptual
skills at being a certain kind of listener, speaker,
disinterested observer, or storyteller (p. 117).
Culture
Those who grow up within the fortunate space of a
still vital culture experience themselves as living
‘within’ a world that contains certain kinds of entities
and events, to which they respond with certain evaluative
orientations—
with surprise, disgust, acceptance,
18
affirmations, resentment, resignation, joy, delight, and so
forth (Shotter, 1993, p. 147).
Mayerfeld Bell (1998) describes culture as the
conversations we have and which we expect to have with
various people in various places and at various times.
Culture
also reflects the conversations we have which we
did not expect to have with these various people in these
various places at these various times.
The ways in which we understand the world are
culturally specific, which means that all ways of
understanding are historically and culturally relative
(Burr, 1995). For example, in the traditional African
culture, a man’s worth is measured by the number of
children he has, and not the type of car he drives or the
size of the house in which he lives. Burr (1995) elaborates
further by saying that the particular forms of knowledge
that abound in any culture are artifacts of it, and we
should not assume that our ways of understanding are better
(in terms of being any nearer the truth) than other ways
(p. 4).
19
Lutz (1990) claims that everyday understanding is a
cultural and social process involving negotiation,
interpersonal evaluation and power struggles. In other
words, the everyday understanding of, say for instance,
single fatherhood, does not simply occur as a form of
reflection on experiences of single fathers, but emerges as
people justify and negotiate both cultural values and
privileges of power that some members of this society hold
(Lutz, 1990).
In a conversation, we do not just say anything about
anything. We negotiate, we discuss, we mistake, we mislead,
and we otherwise stumble into a jointly creative response
to the conditions of our understanding and misunderstanding
(Bell 1998, p. 53). Geertz in Brandstadter (1990, p. 85)
says: “We are incomplete or unfinished animals, who
complete or finish ourselves through culture”.
Social Constructionism is the claim and viewpoint that
the content of our consciousness, and our mode of relating
to others, is taught by our culture and society and that
all the metaphysical quantities we take for granted are
learned from others around us (Owen, 1992, p. 386).
20
Dickerson and Zimmerman (1996) draw attention to the
fact that the constructionist viewpoint considers the
development of certain cultural narrative or ‘discourses’
that are formed by, and in turn influence, people and take
on normative views against which people measure themselves.
According to Gergen (1985), from the constructionist
position, the process of understanding is not automatically
driven by forces of nature, but is the result of an active,
cooperative enterprise of persons in relationships. Each
case of construction of persons or relationships has
undergone significant change across time.
How the society views single fatherhood now depends on
the dominant narrative of the time, and changes in the
concept of single fatherhood do not reflect an alteration
in the concept itself, but one which is lodged in
culturally and historically dependent factors.
Power
Many of the ‘powerful particulars’ of social
life,
like people’s beliefs, their identities and even their
minds, are socially constructed and have a continuously
negotiated and reproduced existence in certain of our
21
social
activities (Shotter, 1993). Power is an idea, a
construction. People create the idea of power and then
behave as if power simply existed in an unmediated way.
However, it is created by the context and is invented by
the protagonist of the situation (Bateson cited in Cecchin,
1992, p. 89).
Foucault’s more general understanding of power as
dynamic begins with his rejection of any reification of
power. He insists that “power is not something that is
acquired, seized, or shared; something that one holds on to
or allows to slip away” (Rouse, 1994, p. 105). In line with
a social constructionist view, Foucault raises questions
about power and writes about the epistemic context within
which bodies of knowledge become intelligible and
authoritative. Foucault argues that particular
investigations were structured terms of which concepts and
statements were intelligible together and how these
statements were organized thematically, as well as which of
these statements counted as ‘serious’, who was empowered to
speak seriously and what questions and procedures were
relevant in order to assess the credibility of those
statements that were taken seriously (Rouse, 1994, p. 93).
22
Andersen (1992) maintains that a social
constructionist stance shows an awareness of power
relations hidden within the assumptions of any social
discourse. Dickerson and Zimmerman (1996) assert that from
a social constructionist point of view, problems such as
abuse and violence are actions taken by someone who is
afforded a position of power by the dominant culture
against a person with less power. Burkit (1998) maintains
that power is not so much expressed by agents in the
acceptance of an orthodox view which needs to be turned
upside down, but is rather the pre-discursive doxa of
accepted ways of interacting that forms the everyday
habitus (p. 177). The problem is not one of challenging the
consciously accepted ideology with a radical discourse;
there must also be a corresponding objective social crisis
that calls into question many of the accepted and implicit
modes of institutionalized activities (Burkit, 1998).
According to Doan (1997), Social Constructionism is
interested in the narratives or discourses that have taken
on a normative standard against which people measure and
judge themselves; it deconstructs the Grand Narratives by
focusing on how the prevailing norms have evolved over
23
time, especially those that marginalize and subjugate
people (p. 129).
Burr (1995) provided an account of Foucault’s view of
power as not being the same as some form of possession that
some people have and others do not, but as an effect of
discourse. Foucault views knowledge as power over others,
the power to define others. Foucault further elaborates
that to define the world or a person in a way that allows
you to do the things you want is to exercise power (Burr,
1995). Foucault in Burr (1995, p. 64) argues that:
To construe the world in terms of those people who are
‘mad’ and those who are ‘sane’ (thereby producing one
particular ‘knowledge’) brings with it a power
inequality between those groups.
Hacking (1999) argues that the primary use of Social
Constructionism is to raise consciousness. Gergen in Burr
(1995) sees people as being motivated by a desire for
speaking rights or voice and to have their interpretation
of events accepted as the truthful one.
24
The challenge for social constructionists is to
transcend the traditional subject-object dualism and all
its attendant problems and to develop a new framework of
analysis based on an alternative theory of the functioning
potentials of science (Gergen, 1985).
Locating Social Constructionism within
psychotherapy
In the mid-eighties, a small group of family
therapists (the Tromso group, the Galveston group, Lynn
Hoffman, Peggy Penn, and others) found themselves
dissatisfied with the ‘objective and absolute’ nature of
traditional approaches to family therapy and began
experimenting with alternative approaches (Andersen, 1992;
Anderson & Goolishian, 1992; Hoffman, 1992; Wick, 1996).
According to Anderson and Goolishian (1992), the social
constructionist therapist adopts the not-knowing position
that entails a general attitude in which the therapist’s
actions communicate an abundant, genuine curiosity. The
therapist’s role, expertise, and emphasis is to develop a
free conversational space and to facilitate an emerging
dialogical process. The emphasis is not to produce change,
but to open space for conversation (Anderson & Goolishian,
25
1992). Cecchin (1992) notes that what therapists
‘discovered’ in therapy depended on the ‘discoverer’ and on
the type of questions that were asked. The challenge for a
therapist is to demolish the old story and move towards a
co-authored new story that opens up new possibilities for
clients.
According to Cecchin (1992), the shift towards Social
Constructionism emanated from the continuous move from an
epistemology based on cybernetic principles. Becvar and
Becvar (2003) asserted that the modernist stance assesses
and attempts to change behaviour relative to the normative
standards and criteria accepted within the larger societal
context. From such a perspective (Becvar & Becvar, 2003),
one defines problems as existing ‘out there’ in a real,
knowable reality.
The social constructionist therapist suggests that
reality is constructed as a function of the belief systems
that one brings to a particular situation and according to
which one operates. Becvar and Becvar (2003) state that,
rather than discovering behaviour, we create it. As
therapists, the way we use language, or choose words to
describe something becomes crucial. Problems are stories
26
people have agreed to tell themselves; therefore,
constructionist therapists have to persuade clients to tell
themselves a different, more empowering story (Hoffman,
1990).
Locating Social Constructionism within
research
Although traditional quantitative, empirical research
is recognized on many fronts as the primary way to make
valid knowledge claims, traditional science tends to focus
only on socially sanctioned research questions consistent
with the ideology of the society (Becvar & Becvar, 2003).
Becvar and Becvar (2003) add that the questions thought
important to investigate are determined by the
social/cultural context in which science operates, and by
the problems and puzzles internal to scientific enquiry.
The dialogues on single-parent families have focused
on their weaknesses rather than their strengths. The
research questions asked have activated values and
political sensitivities and are more likely to be supported
and funded. These projects (Caplan & Nelson in Becvar &
Becvar, 2003, p. 336) hold the potential for reinforcing
27
established stereotypes, thereby perpetuating the
conditions of the ‘problem group’.
The social constructionist approach urges us to
abandon the obsession with truth and representation
(Longino in Becvar & Becvar, 2003). The aim of researchers
utilizing this method is to liberate people from the tight
boxes of normality and attempt to understand individual
human experiences. Within the social constructionist
framework, the ‘objectivity-talk’ of scientists becomes
just part of the discourse of science through which a
particular version of human life is constructed (Burr,
1995, p.160). Feminists view empiricist science as a tool
used by men to construct views of women that contribute to
their subjugation (Gergen, 1995).
Since one cannot be without an epistemology (Bateson
in Becvar & Becvar, 2003), the questions we ask about the
world, our theories and hypotheses arise from the
assumptions that are embedded in our epistemology. The task
of researchers, therefore, is to acknowledge and work with
their own intrinsic involvement in the research process and
the part that this plays in the interpretation of the
results. Social constructionist researchers view research
28
as a co-production between them and the people they are
studying (Burr, 1995; Owen, 1992). Knowledge is constructed
as “interpretive activity and a product of social and
historical circumstances, rather than a more or less direct
reflection of the world of objectively defined facts”
(Henwood & Coughlan in Walters, 1998, p. 23).
The Foucaldian perspective regarding traditional
positivistic production of knowledge is that knowledge is
used to control people while making it appear as though it
is in their (the people’s) own interest, and with the stamp
of ‘science’ to give such knowledge authority (Burr, 1995).
Gergen (1985) claims that social constructionists
removed knowledge from the data-driven and/or the
cognitively necessitated domains and placed it in the hands
of people in relationships. Gergen (1985) further argues
that, although casting doubt on the process of objective
warranting, constructionism offers no alternative truth
criteria; it does not provide any foundational rules of
warrant and in this case it is relativistic. However, this
does not mean that anything ‘goes.’ Lukens and Clarfield
(1992) defend the ‘anything goes’ notion in Social
Constructionism by saying that constructionists are
29
entitled, like any other profession, to choose among
alternatives and to express strong preferences about what
is ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.
Not all views are equal and valid (Doan, 1997; Lukens
& Clarfield, 1992). Doan (1997) notes that some accounts
are not respectful of difference, gender, ethnicity, race
or religion (p. 130). Lukens and Clarfield (1992) disagree
with the assertion that constructionism is relativistic,
apolitical and impersonal. Social constructionists are not
prohibited from having and expressing preferences, hopes,
and opinions (Lukens & Clarfield, 1992, p. 205).
SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISM REVISITED
From the social constructionist view, reality is cocreated between the observer and the observed; therefore,
one cannot remove oneself from the phenomenon that is being
observed. The society’s construction of what a functional
family is has been created by social norms. This reminds us
for instance, that single parenthood and its meanings are
not fixed and inevitable: they are the product of
historical events, social forces and ideology (Hacking,
30
1999). Single parents who accept current norms of emotion
and behaviour may learn that the way they are supposed to
feel and act is not predestined by human nature.
Hacking (1999) points out the fact that Social
Constructionism does not always liberate. For example, a
widowed father who believes that his family is ‘broken’ and
‘dysfunctional’ may not feel liberated. Social construction
theses are liberating chiefly for those who are on the way
to being liberated (Hacking, 1999, p. 2). For instance, the
widowed father’s consciousness about being a good enough
single parent has to be raised first before he can be freed
from the label that society has bestowed on him.
Maturana and Varela (1992) propose that if we know
that our world is necessarily the world we bring forth with
others, every time we are in conflict with another human
being with whom we still want to coexist, we cannot affirm
what for us is certain (an absolute truth) because that
would negate the other person. It is not knowledge, but the
knowledge of knowledge that compels (Maturana & Varela,
1992, p. 248).
31
It may appear as if the social constructionist stance
demands us to be neutral and apolitical. On the contrary,
such a view requires us to have our own opinions. Derrida’s
statement that “there is nothing outside of the text [there
is no outside-text; il n’y a pas de hors-texte]” was
misunderstood by writers and philosophers as meaning that
there is no truth, no reality, no actual history, no actual
flesh-and-blood people in the world, no rocks and trees,
disease, poverty or physical violence (Lucy, 1995, p. 1).
Lucy (1995) remarks that, although Derrida said that there
is nothing outside the text, it does not follow that
anything goes, but rather that opinions, knowledge and
stereotypes are not always what they seem to be.
MODERATE (SCIENTIFIC) REALISM CONSIDERED
The development of Social Constructionism, which is
part of the postmodern movement, arose as a result of a
critique of the positivists who claimed that the knower
could have direct and objective knowledge of reality. This
assertion, which was an extreme positivistic stance towards
reality, resulted in the origin of a movement that also
took an extreme stance towards reality, that is, Social
Constructionism.
32
While the modern period seemed to embrace naively the
philosophy of extreme realism, postmodernism has swung to
the other extreme by advocating an equally unlikely thesis,
namely the thesis of antirealism (Phipps, 2004, p. 360).
Unlike both the philosophy of extreme realism and
antirealism, moderate or scientific realism offers the more
reasonable proposition that: (a) there is, actually, a
reality that exists independently of the knower; and (b)
although the knower cannot have direct or objective
knowledge and, therefore, cannot establish truth, the
knower can have partial knowledge of, or at least a
perspective of it (Phipps, 2004, p. 361). The knower
‘interfaces’ with hard reality by means of language and
linguistic behaviour (F.J.A. Snyders, personal
communication, September 4, 2006).
The advantage of this
proposed view is that unlike realism which tends to
overemphasize the known or reality, and antirealism the
knower, moderate or scientific realism highlights that
knowledge is a function of both the knower and the known,
that is, it is the interaction between them (Phipps, 2004,
p. 361).
33
Consistent with Phipps’ proposal of moderate realism,
Speed (1991) proposes co-constructivism as an alternative
to realism, constructivism and Social Constructionism.
Speed’s theory of co-constructivism embodies the view that
what we know arises in a relationship between the knower
and the known. Co-constructivism takes for granted that a
structured reality exists, but recognizes that this reality
is constructed or mediated in the sense that different
aspects are highlighted according to ideas that people,
individually or in groups, have about it (Speed, 1991, p.
401).
Speed (1991) maintains that adopting the coconstructivist stance will allow therapists to acknowledge
the contribution both of ideas and a structured reality to
what we know. Two major implications of co-constructivism
are (1) a responsibility to be aware of how our ideas
determine what we see and (2), to do more empirical
research, to investigate the reality which exists and which
thus partially determines what we know (Speed, 1991, p.
405).
The next chapter deals with a review of related
literature. The review of the literature will start from
34
single parents in general and how the deficit model of
single parenting has viewed single parents. It will end
with how family normality is viewed from the cybernetics of
cybernetics perspective.
35
CHAPTER 3
LITERATURE REVIEW
The review of available literature will start from the
point of view of single parenting in general. Myths and
realities of single parents and their families will focus
on both single mother and single father families. Included
in the literature will be the perceptions of society of men
as single parents. Literature on the role of fathers in
parenting and the sex-role identification of fathers will
be interrogated. Literature on widowers as single fathers
will also be examined, together with the social isolation
and or systemic embeddedness of single-parent families. As
single-parent families do not exist in isolation from a
larger societal ecology, single parenting from an
ecological perspective will be discussed. Finally, the
normality of families according to a second-order
cybernetics perspective will be evaluated.
36
Historical overview of the literature
There have always been single fathers, but the way in
which men have found themselves in that position has
changed completely in the last hundred and fifty years
(Griffiths, 1997; Lund, 2001). In the 17th century, the same
proportions of men were left single by the death of women,
largely because of the risks of childbirth for women.
According to Lund (2001), widowers either had to hire a
nanny or housekeeper to take care of the children, or
remarry as soon as possible after the death of their
spouse. The last option was considered the most socially
accepted solution.
It was not until the twentieth century that women were
more likely than men to be single parents (Lund, 2001).
Before this time, the man was more likely to provide and
care for the children as the single parent.
According to Shapiro, Diamond and Greenberg (1995), in
the agrarian communities of the past, the father was always
a present figure in the family and he played a special role
at the birth of his children. It was due to the industrial
37
revolution that the father’s role at home diminished. In
South Africa, due to the rise in deaths as a result of the
AIDS pandemic, families find themselves without either the
mother or the father. Statistics reveal that a high
percentage of adults die from AIDS-related infections. The
adult deaths increased by 62% from 1997 to 2002 (SA death
statistics, 2005). Recorded deaths in the age-group 20-45
more than doubled between 1997 to 2002, from 106 033 to 221
260. According to a report by the South African Medical
Research Council (2001), the mortality of young women has
increased rapidly during the last few years, while the rise
among men has been stable. Therefore, there should now be
more families headed by males than in previous years.
Myths and realities of single parents
and their families
In trying to define what constitutes the family,
Kennedy and Spencer King (1994) note that the debate about
the definition of the family focuses on who the members
are, rather than on how family members relate to one
another. Kennedy and Spencer King (1994, p. xi) propose
that the family is
38
made strong not by the number of heads counted at the
dinner table, but by the rituals that help to create
the family, by the memories you share, by the
commitment of time, caring and love you show to one
another, and by the hopes for the future you have as
individuals and as a unit.
This definition of the family is consistent with an
ecological definition of family. Auerswald (1990, p. 29)
defines a family, according to the ecological perspective,
as a patterned set of connected events in a relational
domain.
According to the mechological framework, a family is
defined as a complex object made of parts. The criteria
used to identify its parts are gender, age, and roles
(Auerswald, 1990, p. 28). This definition is similar to the
one that deficit models use.
A remarkably consistent view of single parenting
dominates popular culture as well as public policy. A
single-parent family is a euphemism for ‘problem family’
and some kind of social pathology (Kamerman & Kahn in Dowd,
1997). Stigmatizing single parents is not strange in light
39
of the dominant legal and social definitions of family and
the exalted place in these definitions accorded to the
nuclear, marital, two-parent family (Dowd, 1997). Dowd
(1997) reports that this stigma is informed by the strongly
negative images we have of single mothers. They are
frequently criticized as inadequate, incomplete mothers who
do not mother enough. This stigma is more evident in
relation to Black single mothers.
The powerfully negative images associated with Black
single mothers rarely identify individuals, but instead
stigmatize the entire class of Black mothers (Dowd, 1997).
The dominant culture’s view of unwed Black single mothers
continues to echo in the 1965 Moynihan report:
Ours is a society which presumes male leadership in
private and public affairs. The arrangements of
society facilitate such leadership and reward it.
A subculture such as that of the Negro American, in
which this is not the pattern, is placed at a
distinct disadvantage. Fatherless families are the
root of everything from poverty, violence, drug
addiction, crime and declining standards in
education and civility to teen pregnancy, sexually
40
transmitted disease, narcissism and urban unrest.
(Moynihan in Dowd, 1997, p.10).
Without the role of husband, fathers are seen as
incapable caregivers, or more strongly, as parents who
routinely abandon their children. Men are viewed as parents
who see their children as their biological property, and
who are capable of the most horrifying abuse (Dowd, 1997).
Child development research did not study fathers at
all until the 1970’s (Dowd, 1997). No one is taking any
notice of father. As any suburban father will testify,
today’s family does not fall into a respectful hush when
father starts to speak. Much more ruthlessly, the father is
being ignored by the experts as a subject for research and
conjecture by sociologists, by revolutionaries and
journalists; father is forgotten. Researchers are all too
busy concentrating on mother (Green, 1976, p. 1). The only
time that father is spoken about is when he is being
irresponsible and abusive.
Abramovitch (1997) states that the picture society has
of men is that of savages who are not capable or worthy of
being good parents. Abramovitch (1997) adds that the image
41
of fathers seems to have declined. They are now viewed as
“foolish, self-centred ‘slobs’ whose children far exceed
them in the once fatherly virtues of wisdom, maturity and
discipline” (Abramovitch, 1997, p. 19).
According to a review of sociological literature,
studies of single parenting rarely examine single-parent
families as functional systems. The perception of most
research appears to be: When a marriage dissolves, the
family dissolves; if a marriage never starts, a family
never starts (Gongla in Dowd, 1997, p. 13). The stigma we
attach to single-parent families most significantly results
in economic deprivation and the social isolation of these
families. Studies on single-parent families have focused on
problems encountered by these families and conclusions have
been that single parent families are dysfunctional, broken,
deviant and problem families (Javo, Ronning, Heyerdahl &
Rudmin 2004; Snyman, 1993).
Studies done in South Africa and other countries focus
on single motherhood and are based on the deficit model
(Barrett & Turner, 2005; Dhlomo, 2001; Kuntsche &
Silbereisen, 2004; McInnes, 2004; Roman, 2003). These
studies focused on the problems experienced by single-
42
parent households. Any household that departs from the twoparent, nuclear-type is seen as dysfunctional rather than
as a viable alternative. Monaghan-Leckband (1978) found
that this view fails to acknowledge that problems can be
found in two-parent families as well. Fathers in the
deficit model studies are mentioned as being the cause of
the problems in the family (Adam, Milner, & Scherpf, 1984).
According to Snyman (1993), the single-parent situation
inhibits the realisation of sociopedagogical essentials and
gives rise to problematical educational situations.
The rise of single families is equated with social
decline and the death of the real family (Dowd, 1997). Dowd
(1997) goes on to state that the veneration of the nuclear
marital two-parent family as a core social organisation of
society does not, however, reflect the reality of family
structures. Studies done on single parents, which
concentrated on the deficits of such families, failed to
take into account the fact that to define a family as
functional does not mean that it has to have a particular
structure. All families go through different stages and
will adapt in order to survive. Maturana, in Becvar and
Becvar (2003) points out that systems are structurally
determined and will function according to their
43
composition. One of the problems in the study of singleparent families is society’s definition of normality as it
applies to the family system.
Positive attributes of single-parent families have
been ignored due to the stigma that walls off any
recognition of insights exemplified by single such families
(Dowd, 1997). Single-parent families have much to tell us
and teach us about the functioning of families and their
interaction with broader communities.
Kennedy and Spencer
King (1994) emphasize that single-parent families are as
diverse, and as similar, as any kind of family: “Single
parent-families are large and small, demonstrative and
reserved, neat and sloppy, even rich and sometimes broke”
(Kennedy & Spencer King, 1994, p. 32)
Using a big brush to paint a picture of single-parent
families, as if they had specific enduring characteristics
gives the impression that such units are always in trouble
and they need to be rescued by society. In the real world,
far from the doom and gloom preaching of politicians, and
the make-believe world of television and movies, ordinary
mothers or fathers hold single-parent families together.
These parents care fiercely for their children and
44
exemplify the fact that children raised in single-parent
families can grow into happy, responsible and emotionally
healthy children (Kennedy & Spencer King, 1994). Scholars
have begun to recognize the limitations of a negativistic,
structural approach to the study of families (Dowd, 1997;
Monaghan-Leckband, 1987). They have become aware, for
example, that single-parent families are capable of being
cohesive, warm, supportive, and favourable to the
development of children.
According to Monaghan-Leckband (1978), the deficit
model of single parenting focuses on the weaknesses of what
it defines as deviant family units and fails to enquire as
to the existence of positive elements within these units.
The samples chosen for these studies are from poor, black,
urban, female-headed families. Failure to include families
with stable income and other resources confirms the deficit
model. Not all single families are poor; similarly, not all
two-parent families are financially stable.
Widows and widowers are faced with numerous challenges
as single parents as compared to the divorced or the nevermarried single parent. The widow or widower is faced with
the task of looking after the children, while he or she is
45
still grappling with the trauma of losing his or her spouse
(Bustanoby, 1985; Manganyi, 1994).
Becvar and Becvar
(2003) acknowledge the fact that change in the structure of
the family that occurs as a result of single parenthood
poses some difficulties to both children and parent.
Children do adjust to the changes associated with life in a
single household (Burgess, 1995; Greif, 1995; O’Neill &
Mendelsohn, 2001).
Role of fathers in parenting
In trying to clarify terminology, Tanfer and Mott in
Sullivan (2000, p. 2) distinguish between ‘fatherhood’ as a
status attained by having a child, and ‘fathering’ that
includes the procreative act and all the childrearing roles
that fathers may fulfill. Sullivan (2000, p. 2) further
elaborates on the distinction made by Tanfer and Mott by
saying that ‘social fatherhood’ is more meaningful than
biological fatherhood.
The concept of ‘role’ is defined by Heiss in Mendes
(1975, p. 7) as a prescription for interpersonal behaviours
that are associated particularly with socially recognized
categories of persons. Burgess (1995, p. 448) defines roles
46
as prescriptions and expectations of the self and others
for the behaviours that are required in any particular
situation.
Fathers play an important role in parenting, and the
degree of their involvement is culturally determined.
Marsiglio in Sullivan (2000) argues that the images of
fatherhood include stereotypes and ideal, as well as some
not so ideal images (p. 2). Adam et al (1984) describe the
father’s role in polyandry marriages in the Marquesas
Islands. One woman marries several men; among them there is
a head husband and a secondary husband. The head husband
disciplines the children and serves as a sex-role model for
the children. The secondary husband maternally loves,
supports and nurtures the children. The Trobiand Islanders
of Malenesia do not recognise biological fatherhood. The
man holds two roles, that of a father to his sister’s
children and that of a mother to his own children.
The endless variety of family structures shows that it
was culture, not biology, which dictated child-rearing
practices (Adam et al, 1984; Levine, 1976). Margaret Mead
suggested that any claim for an innate nurturing potential
in women, or for a biologically rooted dependence of
47
children on their mothers alone was susceptible to becoming
a new and subtle form of antifeminism in which men, under
the guise of exalting maternity, are tying women more
tightly to their children (Levine, 1976, p. 25).
Nevertheless, research into child development proceeded in
the 1950’s and 1980’s with an almost singular fixation on
the relationships between children and their mothers, with
Bowlby’s hypothesis providing a guiding framework (Levine,
1976).
Father-custodian families face certain unique problems
because of their atypical status in our culture. They exist
in a climate of prejudice, disapproval, or at best
wariness. This creates difficulties in several domains and
many people express their doubts about the father’s ability
to perform as a single parent (Warshak, 1987). Single
fathers are confronted with the stereotyped roles given to
them by society. Stereotypes are general beliefs and
expectations about people which result in people
simplifying complexity by systematizing and ordering
information into categories (Grieve & van Deventer, 2005).
Grieve and van Deventer (2005) further state that
stereotypes create expectations that allow us to perceive
selectively, recognize information that confirms our
48
expectations, and overlook information that refutes our
expectations. For many men, gaining sole custody of their
child, rather than being present at the birth, is when they
first experience what truly becoming a father is like
(Greif, 1995).
According to Parsons’ and Bales’ sex role theory
(1956), the family is a sub-system within the larger system
of society. Parsons and Bales (1956) distinguish two
parental roles in the nuclear family: the instrumental and
expressive roles. The father traditionally plays the
instrumental role. His primary responsibility is to liaise
between the family and society. The mother, on the other
hand plays the expressive role. She is the nurturer, loves
her children unconditionally and allows them to grow in a
loving environment that promotes emotional well-being.
Men’s roles in parenting have been seen only in terms of
being financial provider to the family, while mothers have
been viewed as the nurturers (Parsons & Bales, 1955).
Pollack (1995) argues that men’s nurturing urge, often
suppressed in boyhood and adult socialization tasks, could
be stimulated dramatically by becoming a father. Lamb
(1995) adds that in the last decade and a half,
49
professional and public interest in the roles played by
fathers in their children’s development has increased
enormously.
In this era of paternal rediscovery,
psychologists believe that fathers might have an important
role to play in childrearing (Lamb, 1995). This refocus
highlights a shift from a concern with fathers as persons
primarily involved in the economic support of the family,
and perhaps in the discipline and control of older
children, to a view that placed increasing emphasis on the
role that fathers play in the direct care of their children
(Lamb, 1995).
To understand the current concern and confusion about
fatherhood, it may be useful to step back historically and
examine the changes in the conceptualization of paternal
roles that have taken place. According to Pleck in Lamb
(1995), one can identify four phases or periods over the
last two centuries of American social history where a
different dominant image of fathers came into focus.
50
Moral Father
The earliest phase was one that extended from Puritan
times through the Colonial period into early Republican
times (Lamb, 1995). The ideal father of the colonial period
was the stern patriarch (Pleck in Lamb, 1995). During this
period, the father’s role was perceived as being dominated
by responsibility for moral supervision and moral teaching.
Fathers were primarily responsible for ensuring that their
children grew up with an appropriate sense of values,
acquired primarily from the study of religious material
like the Bible. Therefore, it was the father’s duty to
ensure that his children were literate so that they could
read the scriptures.
The father’s role as a moral guardian was to ensure
that the children were academically equipped to adopt and
maintain Christian ways (Lamb, 1995). Nsamenang (1985)
states that West African fathers are the explorers of the
world outside the home and their role is to filter the
beliefs, attitudes, and practices of their society. The
West African father adopts tenets like those found in the
51
Bible and cultural taboos to teach morality and acceptable
behaviour.
The Breadwinner
A shift occurred in the dominant conceptualization of
the father’s role around the time of centralized
industrialization (Pleck in Lamb, 1995). Pleck in Lamb
(1995) further points out that instead of being defined in
terms of moral teaching, the father’s role came to be
defined largely in terms of being a financial provider for
the family. This conceptualization of the father endured
from the mid-nineteenth century through the Great
Depression. Because breadwinning became so central to
fatherhood in the nineteenth century, the failure to
support a family, always a grievous sin, took centre stage
in Victorian melodrama (Pleck in Lamb, 1995). The other
aspects of the father’s role, such as the presumed
responsibility for moral guardianship, did not disappear,
but breadwinning came into focus as the most defining
characteristic of fatherhood (Lamb, 1995).
52
The Gender-Role Model
The Great Depression, the New Deal, and the disruption
brought about by the Second World War occasioned a new
conceptualization of fatherhood (Lamb, 1995). Breadwinning
and moral guardianship roles remained important, but the
focus shifted to the father’s function as a gender role
model. This shift arose because of the concern that boys
raised exclusively by women were becoming overly feminized
(Mintz in Talitwala, 2005). The family professionals called
on fathers to become more involved with their sons, provide
sex education and serve as role models of masculine
maturity (Talitwala, 2005, p. 8).
The New Nurturant Father
The fourth stage was finally reached around the mid-1970’s
(Lamb, 1995). For the first time fathers were perceived as
active, nurturant, caretaking parents. Active parenting was
defined as the central component of fatherhood and as the
yardstick by which ‘good fathers’ might be assessed (Lamb,
1995, p. 21). Blackenhorn in Dowd (1997) criticizes and
demolishes ‘the New Father’, the sensitive, caring, involved
father, because the new father looks too much like a father who
53
has learned to mother. Blackenhorn in Dowd (1997) argues that
children’s needs can only be met by mothers and fathers
adopting gender specific roles. Furthermore, he argues, the
notion of androgynous parenting is nothing more than a selfish
desire grounded in individualistic narcissism:
It is a denial of sexual complementarity and ultimately
a denial of generativity, which is, much more than the
female’s, largely a social construction …
(Blackenhorn
in Dowd, 1997, p. 30)
Blackenhorn’s qualities of good fathering sound like the
stereotype of the traditional father (Dowd, 1997). Jackson
(1987) argues that fathers who express non-traditional beliefs
about parental roles feel more competent in their roles of
single parenting.
Besides financial and emotional challenges, often the
little things prove to be the toughest. Some parents said
that they found it very difficult to combine the two roles,
to be loving and affectionate but also to be the
disciplinarian (Shaw, 2005). A single father or mother is
faced with the difficulty of fulfilling both these roles.
54
According to Ehrensaft (1995), fathers have a nine-tofive quality to their parenting. Men do mothering whereas
women are mothers. This means that men exhibit more
separateness when parenting and women more connectedness.
Ehrensaft (1995) believes that a father is much clearer as
to where he stops and the child starts, whereas mothers
have a hard time sorting out their own needs from their
children’s.
Fathers today have permission, tentative and unsure,
but permission nonetheless, to be more emotionally present
in their families, rather than having fatherhood defined
primarily by the breadwinner/provider role (Osherson,
1997). The fact that fathers can be more than breadwinners
or providers in their families could be one reason why some
studies (Burgess, 1998; Greif, 1990; Monaghan-Leckband,
1978) found widowed men to cope better with lone parenting
than widowed women.
Lamb (1997) claims that a good enough father is
expected to be close but not too close, strong but not
overwhelming. The difficulty for fathers at times is how to
combine the contrasting images of authority and intimacy
into a coherent whole. Osherson (1995) believes that the
55
very definition of what it means to be a good father has
shifted from being concerned primarily with the
provider/breadwinner role to embracing more ambiguous
expectations of emotional involvement and responsiveness:
“We live in a time with many contradictory demands on men——
that we be open with our feelings but also be able to get
the job done, that we be expressive but also stoic, be
gentle but also strong and be able to protect and defend”
(Osherson, 1995, p. 208).
There is no single father role to which all fathers
should aspire. Rather, a successful father, as defined in
terms of his children’s development, is one whose role
performance matches the demands and prescriptions of his
socio-cultural and familial context (Lamb, 1997). According
to Berger and Luckmann in Kost (2001), roles within the
family such as father and mother are constructed by
society. These ‘agreed-upon meanings’ would change over
time and individual behaviours and routines associated with
these roles will adapt in response to these different
meanings (Kost, 2001).
56
Widowers as single parents
The death of a spouse is considered the most traumatic
of all life’s experiences (Burgess, 1995; O’Neill &
Mendelsohn, 2001; Rando, 1988). Depending on the
relationship one had during one’s marriage, the loss of a
spouse is a major loss in one’s life. For most of us, the
relationship with our mate is a critically important and
exclusive one (Rando, 1988, p. 27). One of the major roles
one’s spouse had was as someone who affirmed your identity,
someone who helped define who one was in many diverse ways.
Losing a spouse means that one lost someone who probably
perceived the world in the same way, someone who probably
shared the same opinions about common friends and so forth.
Unless one had time to anticipate and rehearse new roles
because of the length of a spouse’s illness, one may have
many new tasks to learn as one attempts to get used to life
without a mate (Rando, 1988, p. 129).
Burgess (1995, p. 448) defines a widowed father as a
man who assumes custody and primary care of his children
following the death of his wife. Death as the cause of
single parenthood and how it affects the father of a
nuclear family are topics that are rarely examined,
57
especially when dealing with men as single parents with
children of school-going age (O’Neill & Mendelsohn, 2001).
Burgess (1985, p. 416) states:
The problem with travelling on unchartered waters is
that one has no ‘maps’ with which to check one’s
course. So it is with writing a chapter on widowers
as fathers.
All parents need to develop a balance between their
own needs and those of their children (Silverman in Boerner
& Silverman, 2001). Most bereaved parents do this with
varying degrees of sensitivity and responsiveness to their
offspring’s needs. Fathers tend to assume a parent-oriented
and administrative style, while mothers generally reflect a
more child-oriented and nurturing style (Boerner &
Silverman, 2001). Traditionally, black men are not
perceived as being capable of looking after the children.
The father’s in-laws may demand custody of the children
after the death of their mother.
Single fathers adjust well to their new role of
parenting if there is no hostility regarding custody of the
children (Cohen, 1995). Greif (1990) and Christofferson
58
(1998) argue that widowers manage to take care of their
children just as well as other single fathers and generally
do a better job than single mothers in the same situation.
They may struggle initially to adjust to the new role, as
they are not only dealing with their new responsibilities,
but are also faced with their children’s and their own
pain. Greif’s (1990) study of 36 widowers found, that with
time, most fathers and their children cope. Single fathers
who choose the single-parent role tend to have an easier
task than those who are forced into adopting it (Greif,
1995).
A study by Boerner and Silverman (2001) concludes that
men and women have different coping patterns after the loss
of a spouse. Men perceive loss in terms of its meaning in
their own life, focusing on the future without their wives.
They frequently frame their thoughts in terms of the longterm consequences of the loss. Mothers, on the other hand,
seem to focus more on the family’s day-to-day activities.
While widowed fathers continue to fulfill the
traditional role of provider in the family, they are also
capable of giving loving care to the children who need
emotional and physical support (Burgess, 1995). Men become
59
very good parents when given the opportunity to look after
their children (Burgess, 1995; Bustanoby, 1985). Burgess
(1995) further states that the widowed father finds it less
difficult to adjust to the new role of sole parenting if he
was involved in child-rearing while the wife was still
alive.
The circumstances surrounding the death of the wife
also have an effect on the adjustment process. Whether
death happened suddenly or resulted from a chronic illness
makes a difference in terms of the father’s adjustment
(Sanders, 1999; Volkan & Zintl, 1997). To the extent that
there was time for appropriate preparation, fathers tend to
experience less of an assault on their ability to cope than
when the wife’s death is totally unexpected (Rando, 1988,
p. 52).
Weizman and Kamm (1987) state that it is natural
for the bereaved person to mull over the circumstance of
any death, but when the loss has been sudden because of
heart a attack, stroke, accident, or the result of
horrifying events, it takes even longer to recover.
Single parenting is not easy under any circumstances;
it is particularly overwhelming when you are simultaneously
struggling to cope with the loss of your loved one
60
(Burgess, 1995; Rando, 1988). Rando (1988, p. 135) claims
that:
The death of your spouse confronts you with the
loss of a significant part of yourself, someone who
was crucial in helping you define yourself and your
world. More than many losses, it can prompt the
need for major identity changes and assumptions of
new skills and roles that may challenge much of
your previous sex-role conditioning and experience.
Adjusting to single-parent status is a process that
one goes through by learning to cope with the new demands
of one’s changed parenting role and by establishing one’s
identity as a single person (O’Neill & Mendelsohn, 2001, p.
179).
Sex-role identification
According to Dowd (1997), the sex-role hypothesis is
often connected to the Freudian assumption that both a
mother and a father must be present for appropriate sexrole and normal child development. Freudian and cognitive
theories of child development hypothesize that children
61
learn through modelling, particularly by identifying with
the same-sex parent. However, Belchman and Carlson in Dowd
(1997) found that studies concluded that two heterosexual
parents are not necessary for healthy cognitive, emotional,
or sex-role development. High quality parenting in single
parent families can compensate for lack of the other
parent, while low quality parenting can negatively
influence children’s development in intact two-parent homes
(Belchman & Carlson in Dowd, 1997).
Pedersen (1981) argues that the traditional theoretical
approach to female and male behaviour has been in terms of a
unidimensional, bipolar construct in which masculinityfemininity is roughly equated with the instrumental-expressive
dimensions. Rather than using the ‘either/or’ theory when
describing sex-roles, the ‘both/and’ theory may be useful.
It
has been found that many men and women are androgynous
(Pedersen, 1981). They are more likely to perform cross-sex
behaviour and are less constrained by sex-role stereotypes.
Lamb (1997) asserts that fathers and mothers seem to
influence their children in similar, rather than dissimilar
ways. Lamb (1997) further states that characteristics of
individual fathers, such as their masculinity, intellect, and
62
even their warmth are less important than the characteristics
of the relationships that they have established with their
children. Studies on father-infant relationships (Lamb, 1997)
showed that both mothers and fathers are capable of behaving
sensitively and responsively in interaction with their infants.
With the exception of lactation, there is no evidence that
women are biologically predisposed to be better parents than
men are. Lamb (1997) further argues that social conventions,
not biological imperatives, underlie the traditional division
of parental responsibilities. According to Biller and LopezKimpton (1997), children who experience positive father
involvement are likely to develop their personal resources and
social competence.
Hosley and Montemayor (1997) explored the difference
between father-adolescent and mother-adolescent
relationships, and their findings showed fathers to be a
weak link in the companionate family. These conclusions,
which portray fathers as worse parents than mothers, are
based on the deficit approach of single parenting.
How a man defines his role within the family is
important in shaping his interactions with his children
(Hosley & Montemayor, 1997). Fathers may not be as
63
uninvolved and distant as the research suggests. Instead,
the findings may be based on the instruments used, which
may be focusing on the negative characteristics of fathers
(Hosley & Montemayor, 1997). In a society that relies
heavily on ‘experts’, it is important to realize that what
the experts tell us depends largely on the questions they
ask or the questions they consider important (or possible)
to ask (Levine, 1976, p. 23).
Lewis (1997) states that if there are differences
between mothers and fathers, these are not easy to measure
and do not have the demonstrable effects on the child that
were once assumed in the child development literature.
Lewis (1997) argues that rather than looking for simple
cause-effect patterns, one needs to examine the effects of
a network of family relationships on the child’s
development. The family is a sociological microcosm where
negotiations between members and displays of affection,
interest and instruction may tell us more about the system
than the individuals concerned (Lewis, 1997).
64
Social isolation and or systemic embeddedness
of single parent families
The African proverb that says that it takes the whole
village to raise a child is very meaningful for single
parents. Very few single parents are alone in caring for
their children. The extended family is always available to
help the lone parent take care of the children. In the
traditional African context, marriage does not simply place
between a man and a woman as in Western societies where it
ideally follows the love, interest and free personal choice
of the individuals; marriage occurs between families or
even communities (Nsamenang, 1987). Therefore, if one
spouse dies, the extended family or the community will help
the remaining spouse to take care of his nuclear family.
Several studies (Burgess, 1995; Bustanoby, 1985; Greif,
1990; Greif, 1995; Monaghan-Leckband, 1978) have shown that
widowers receive more support from the extended family than
other parents.
The deficit model of single parenting claims that
single parents are more emotionally and socially isolated
than parents in two parent families (Monaghan-Leckband,
1978). Jones (1985) maintains that a single parent is less
65
likely to be parenting alone than is suggested by the term
single parent. Single parents often seek help from other
family members and friends. According to Leinonen, Solantus
and Punamaki (2003), single parents experience more
emotional and instrumental support than parents with
spouses.
Makhudu (1993) points out that the development of
human potential requires traits such as warmth,
understanding, reciprocation and cooperation, which
collectively make up the Ubuntu culture. Makhudu (1993)
regards the qualities that make up the Ubuntu way of life,
or true humaneness, as existing in every person,
irrespective of the culture to which they belong: “A person
is a person through other persons”, “n Mens is n mens deur
ander mense” (Afrikaans). Simply put it reads: “I am,
because you are” which is at the heart of an African way of
thinking (Makhudu, 1993, p. 40).
According to Ladd and Zvonkovic (1995), cross-cultural
research indicates that the type of social network varies
between and within cultural groups. Gunnarsson and Cochran
in Ladd and Zvonkovic (1995) compared married and divorced
mothers from Sweden and the United States and found that
66
the support network of all single mothers was smaller due
to the loss of the ex-spouse’s relatives. The Mexican
American single women were isolated from their friendship
network but remained closer to their extended kin (Wagner
in Ladd & Zvonkovic, 1995).
Social support in the Black culture is highly valued
and a major strength of Black family life lies in its
social support system. Aunts and grandmothers are always
available to look after children when parents are not able
to do so. Every grown-up is seen as a parent; therefore,
there is a saying in the African tradition that there are
no orphans as long as there is a community. Viewing singleparent families against this background challenges the
deficit model of single parents and their families. The
extended family ties are not as strong as they have been
since urbanization, but there is still a sense of
responsibility towards one another. The widower appears to
get more support and sympathy from their kin than the never
married and divorced parent (Bustanoby, 1985).
A study by Monaghan- Leckband (1978) consisting of 40
female and 20 male single parents challenges the claim by
the deficit model of single parenthood that asserts that
67
single parents are emotionally and socially isolated from
their kinship and friendship network. Most of the
respondents reported that they did not interact with
friends and relatives as frequently when they were married
as they did when they became single parents. The study
concludes that the health of the two-parent family is
overrated at the expense of other family units. MonaghanLeckband (1978) argues that the idealization of the twoparent family has masked both its weaknesses and the
strengths of the single parent family. Only a few of the
respondents reported a sharp decrease in kinship
interaction. A strong parental coalition, such as that
between single parents and their own parents, is a feature
of higher functioning single parent families (Minuchin,
Rosman, & Baker, 1978).
Challenges for single fathers
In a traditional two-parent family, the mother is the
parent who is generally expected to shop, prepare meals for
the children, do laundry and keep the children and the
house clean. In one-parent families, the responsibility for
these tasks rests with the single parent; since these
68
activities are usually assigned to women, single male
parents may experience role strain (Mendes, 1978; Prater,
1995; Shireman, 1995). Single parenting is not easy for any
parent, be it a single mother or a single father. The
remaining parent has to change the way they feel about
themselves. Their career plans may have to be redefined.
They are at times forced to reduce their working hours,
resulting in a lower salary. Shaw (2005) states that,
although single parents vary in shape, size, sex and
circumstance, the one factor most have in common is that
they never expected to end up as single parents.
Financial difficulties
Loss of income from one spouse as happens in widowhood
is a major problem faced by the widower. Unlike a divorced
parent who may receive maintenance from the other parent,
the widower does not. Lino (1995) claims that the poverty
rate among the widowed and the never-married single parent
is higher than it is for the divorced. For employed single
mothers/fathers, child care can be a large expense (Lino,
1995).
69
Social interaction/redefinition of role
When men enter the role of single parenthood following
the death of their wives, it causes difficulty in many
relationships with others (Lund, 2001). During this phase
of the man’s life, there is a restructuring of roles, which
occurs in both his personal and public life. The
implications and consequences for the widower and how he
addresses the issue of being a single parent are based
largely on how he defines the new role through interactions
with others (Lund, 2001).
SINGLE PARENTING FROM AN ECOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE
According to Auerswald (1990), the rules of an
ecological paradigm in family therapy do not include an
either/or dualism and the confrontations and paradoxes
which this creates; they do not adhere to linear time and
causality. These rules require that attention be paid to
patterned sets of events and how they are connected; the
domain of relational connectedness (Auerswald, 1990, p.
36).
70
To help in the understanding of single parents in
different social environments, the ecological approach will
be introduced. The ecological perspective provides the
structural and functional framework for the analysis of
single-parent families. In the ecological framework, what
happens outside the family unit also influences what
happens within it (Burgess, 1995).
Obiechina in Nsamenang (1987, p. 279), vividly
portrays the relationship between the individual and his
community as follows:
The West African stories tend to show the
individual characters not through their private
psychological experiences, but through
community and social life and activities of
collective and general nature with individual
sentiments and actions deriving force and logic
from those of the community.
This perspective views single parents and their
environments as mutually shaping systems, each changing
over time, and adapting to changes in each other.
71
Four different levels of systems that affect the family
will be discussed:
Microsystems
Microsystems are settings in which individuals
experience and create day-to-day reality (Hanson, 1985, p.
57). The family is a microsystem within which the widower
and children interact together (Burgess, 1995).
Mesosystems
Mesosystems are the relationships between several
microsystems, including extended family members and friends
(Burgess, 1995). When the single parent receives support
from relatives and friends, children are much less likely
to develop behaviour or educational problems
(Bronfenbrenner in Burgess, 1995).
Ecosystems
Ecosystems involve ongoing patterns of interaction
between settings that include home, child care programmes,
the school, and the parent’s place of work (Burgess, 1995).
72
Widowers are unable to escape the demands of their work as
they are the only support to their children. The business
world is not sympathetic towards widowed fathers.
Macrosystems
A macrosystem refers to the overarching institutional
patterns of the culture or subculture such as religion,
which protect the sanctity of the family (Burgess, 1995).
Microsystems, mesosystems and ecosystems are set within the
macrosystem.
CYBERNETICS OF CYBERNETICS VIEW OF
FAMILY NORMALITY
Early efforts at understanding family functioning
employed a deficit model focussing on structure rather than
on process (Monaghan-Leckband, 1987). This pattern of
doomsday thinking has been most apparent in discussions
revolving around concerns that the prevalence of deviations
from the traditional two-parent family will inevitably
produce negative consequences for children (Coontz in
Becvar & Becvar, 2003).
73
Becvar and Becvar (2003) described a cybernetics of
cybernetics view of family normality. Given the notion of
structural determinism, systems respond to various
perturbations in a manner consistent with its structure.
Therefore, all systems do what they do, and what they do is
not pathological unless we so define it. Welsh in Becvar
and Becvar (2003) states that: “the guiding question is
that of how families with variant forms and requisites,
organise their resources and function to accomplish their
objectives” (p. 106). We are more concerned with how
families do best what it is they want to do than we are
with what they are doing (Bevcar & Becvar, 2003). Finally,
well-functioning families have a transcendental value
system that embodies a sense of relatedness and continuity
in terms of both time and space.
The next chapter will deal with the methodology that
will be used in exploring the experiences of widowers as
single parents. Since the aim is not to generalise the
findings, a qualitative approach will be used. This
approach will enable the researcher to a fuller
understanding, through their stories, of how widowers
experience single parenthood.
74
CHAPTER 4
METHODOLOGY
Introduction
This chapter discusses the methodology that will be used
in an attempt to create voices for widowed single fathers.
The chapter covers the following aspects: Qualitative
research as a method of study; Social Constructionism as a
qualitative approach; sampling; data collection; data
analysis, namely thematic analysis; trustworthiness of
qualitative studies, and ethical issues.
Traditionally, research has been conceived as a creation
of true, objective knowledge, following a scientific method
(Alvesson & Skoldberg, 2000). “From what appears or is
presented as data, facts, the unequivocal imprints of
‘reality’, it is possible to acquire a reasonably adequate
basis for empirically grounded conclusions and, as a next
step, for generalizations and theory-building” (Alvesson &
Skoldberg, 2000, p. 1).
75
De Vos et al (2005, p. 3) use Webster’s Dictionary
definition of
science as “accumulated and accepted
knowledge that has been systemized and formulated with
reference to the discovery of general truths or the
operation of general laws … especially knowledge obtained
and tested through use of the scientific method”. The
scientific method refers to ideas, rules, techniques and
approaches used by a group of people sharing the same norms
for both research activity and acceptance of scientific
findings and explanations (de Vos et al 2005, p. 5). It is
based on the aforementioned definition of research that
qualitative research is seen as being ‘sloppy’ by
quantitative researchers.
Qualitative research paradigm
The qualitative research paradigm stems from an antipositivistic, interpretive approach. It is holistic in
nature and aims mainly to understand social life and the
meaning that people attach to everyday life (Fouche &
Delport, 2002, p. 79). Qualitative research produces
descriptive data in the participant’s own written or spoken
words. The qualitative researcher is therefore concerned
with the understanding (verstehen) rather than with the
76
explanation and subjective exploration of reality from the
perspective of an insider. This is opposed to the outsider
perspective that is predominant in the quantitative
paradigm (Fouche & Delport, p. 79).
Qualitative research implies an emphasis on the
qualities of entities and on processes and meanings that
are not experimentally examined or measured in terms of
quantity, amount, intensity, or frequency (Denzin &
Lincoln, 2003, p. 13). Qualitative researchers stress the
socially constructed nature of reality, the intimate
relationship between the researcher and what is being
studied, and the situational constraints that shape
inquiry.
Consistent with qualitative research, Avesson and
Skoldberg (2000) state that knowledge cannot be separated
from the knower. They (Avesson & Skoldberg, 2000) say that
data and facts are the constructions or results of
interpretation.
In an effort to move beyond the current pathological
view of single parenting, I sought a method that lent
itself more fully to the portrayal of the fluctuations and
77
many dimensions of the human experience. The central
assumption of the methodology of this study is that “the
way people talk about their lives is important and the
language they use and the connections they make reveal the
world they see and in which they act” (Gilligan in Simmons,
1984, p. 61).
A major factor in the methodology selection was the
recognition of the significance of the personal involvement
of the researcher. My interest in single parenting did not
just ‘happen’ but was generated because of who I am and my
experiences, past and present, and my own understanding,
interpretation and re-interpretation of those experiences.
I wanted a methodology that provided new possibilities and
thought about single parenting.
Social Constructionism
The qualitative approach chosen for this study is
informed by Social Constructionism. According to Becvar and
Becvar (2003, p. 92), Social Constructionism is dedicated
to the understanding of the development of knowledge about
human beings and their behaviours in order to generate more
livable accounts of them and their behaviour.
78
Social Constructionism understands reality, knowledge,
facts, texts, selves, and so on as community-generated and
community-maintained linguistic entities (Anderson, 1994,
p. 1). From the social constructionist perspective,
language lives only in the dialogic interaction of those
who make use of it and it creates something that never
existed before, something absolutely new and unrepeatable
(Shotter in Billig, 1988, p. 13). Efran, Lukens and Lukens
(1990) add that it is through language that meanings are
created. The words we use have arbitrary meanings, but once
words become attached to particular meanings, they are
‘fixed’ in that relationship so that the same word always
has the same meaning (Burr, 1995, p. 39).
Language is a fundamentally social phenomenon; it is
something that occurs between people, whether they are
having a conversation, writing a letter or book (Burr,
1995). It is in such exchanges between people that the
construction of the meaning can take place. Burr (1995, p.
59) adds that language has the capacity to transcend the
‘here and now’, thereby bridging different zones with the
reality of everyday life by integrating them into a
meaningful whole.
Social Constructionism invites an
79
analysis of how we construct and use our professional
knowledge (Becvar & Becvar, 2003).
Owen (1992) describes Social Constructionism as the
claim and viewpoint that the content of our consciousness
is taught by our culture and society. Dickerson & Zimmerman
(cited in Rapmund, 2005) state that the social
constructionist perspective locates meaning in the
understanding of how ideas and attitudes are developed over
time. This approach is coherent with the research
statement, as it will enable the researcher to gain indepth information about the proposed study. The researcher
does not claim to know what the findings of the study will
be.
According to Becvar and Becvar (2003), the goal of
Social Constructionism provides for a more humane and more
socially and politically sensitive understanding of
families. Meaning is not given to the situation, but
emerges from it (Bakhtin, cited in Maykut & Morehouse,
1994).
80
Sampling
According to Maykut and Morehouse (1994), qualitative
researchers set out to build a sample that includes people
selected with the goal of gaining deep understanding of a
particular phenomenon experienced by a carefully selected
group of people. Purposive sampling is used for this study.
Neuman (1997) explains that the rationale of purposive
sampling is less to generalize to a larger population than
it is to gain a deeper understanding of the phenomenon
under study.
Four participants were used for the study
since they were the only ones available and willing to take
part in the study. Others felt that they did not want to
talk about issues relating to their parenting and the loss
of their spouses.
Sampling size
This study is based on interviews conducted with four
widowed fathers, two Black and two White, residing in
Gauteng. These fathers had to have a child or children
below 18 years of age and who stay with them full-time. The
selection of participants depended on the availability and
willingness of the participants to take part in the study.
81
Sampling problems
Finding widowers who were still single parents was
difficult. Friends and colleagues who were asked if they
knew single widowed fathers said: “fathers always marry as
soon as they can after the death of their wives, why don’t
you use single mothers, there are plenty of those”. One
lady from a support group responded like this when I asked
her if she perhaps knew any white or black widowers: “In
the twenty years that I have worked for this organization,
I have never seen or heard of white widowers”. This showed
the stereotypes around men as single parents and widowers.
Contacting participants
Three of the participants were selected on the basis
of information from the oncology unit of a private hospital
in Pretoria. The social worker was excited to hear that I
intended to study widowed single fathers. She said that
there were many fathers who lost their wives due to cancer.
I anticipated problems regarding the willingness of the
participants to explore their feelings surrounding their
changed role, as they might have to revisit the painful
memories surrounding the loss of their wives. The
researcher was aware of a need for a safe space to be
82
created for the participants. The fourth participant was
discovered as a result of a recommendation from a friend.
The four fathers were very eager to take part in the study.
The social worker made the initial contact with the fathers
and I telephoned them to explain the nature of the study
and to arrange for interviews.
Data Collection
In-depth interviews are used for this study with the
goal of exploring the participants’ experiences. The
following questions or exploratory comments were developed
as guidelines for the interviewing process:
•
When did your wife die?
•
How did she die?
•
How did it feel you when you first became a
single parent?
•
Did you have to make any adjustments—
(a) in your job?
(b) socially?
(c) learn new skills, like cooking?
•
How has being single affected your social life?
•
Who helps you with the children?
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•
Did any community agency such as the school or
church help in any way?
•
What do you think are the best things about being
a single parent?
•
What are the challenges of single parenting?
•
How do you think your child/ren rate you as a
parent?
•
How do you rate yourself as a parent?
•
Could
you
have
done
anything
differently
regarding your single parenting so far?
•
If you had a chance to meet someone who has just
lost a wife and has children to look after by
himself, what would you say to him?
According to (Greeff, 2005; Kahn & Cannell in Marshall
& Rossman, 1999; Maytuk & Morehouse, 1994), interviews are
defined as a conversation with a purpose. Kvale in Greeff
(2005) states that qualitative interviews are attempts to
understand the world from the participant’s point of view.
The purpose of interviews is not to get answers to
questions, but to understand the experiences of people and
the meaning they make of their experience (Greeff, 2005).
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All interviews were audio-taped and the participants
granted written permission for the audio-taping of the
interviews. These recordings were transcribed word for word
and the resulting texts analyzed.
Data Analysis
Data analysis is the process of bringing order,
structure, and interpretation to the mass of collected
data. It is a messy, ambiguous, time-consuming, fascinating
and creative process. It does not proceed in a linear
fashion. It is not neat (Marshall & Rossman, 1999, p. 150).
Marshall and Rossman (1999) further states that data
collection and analysis go hand in hand to build a coherent
interpretation of the data. Geertz in Terre Blanche and
Kelly (1999, p. 139) says that the purpose of interpretive
analysis is to provide ‘thick description’ by which is
meant a thorough description of the characteristics,
processes, transactions and contexts that constitute the
phenomenon being studied. According to Terre Blanche and
Durrheim (1999) and Maytuk and Morehouse (1999), in
qualitative studies there is no clear point where data
collection stops and analysis begins. In this study, data
analysis started during the interview process.
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The initial step in data analysis includes awareness
by the researcher of her preconceived ideas (Maykut &
Morehouse, 1994). The researcher engages to remove, or at
least be aware of prejudices, viewpoints, or assumptions
regarding the phenomenon under investigation; this process
is called ‘epoche’ by Katz in Maykut & Morehouse (1994, p.
123). Going through the process of epoche helped the
researcher to investigate the phenomenon from a fresh and
open view, without prejudgment or imposing meaning too
soon.
Thematic content analysis is used to interpret data.
Thematic analysis involves identifying particular themes
that occur in the material that is being studied. The
following steps are just a helpful starting point, as data
analysis is not always neat in qualitative studies. The
steps that the researcher follows in data analysis are
discussed by Terre Blanche & Kelly (1999) as follows:
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Step 1: Familiarization and immersion
Data gathering is not just a mindless technical
exercise, but involves the development of ideas and
theories about the phenomenon being studied. Preliminary
understanding of the meaning of the data was acquired
before the process of data analysis began. This process
enabled the researcher to familiarize herself with the
data. The researcher listened to the tapes and read the
transcribed interviews. The texts were read through many
times over, and notes, diagrams, and drawings were made.
Step 2: Inducing themes
Induction means to infer general rules or classes from
specific instances. The researcher looked at the material
and worked out what the organizing principles are that
naturally underscore the material. The language of the
participants was used rather than abstract theoretical
language to label categories. Processes, functions,
tensions and contradictions were examined. The researcher
attempted to isolate three or more emergent themes to
achieve an optimum level of complexity.
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Step 3: Coding
Coding is undertaken during the activity of developing
themes. Using the same colour highlighter for words with
similar meanings will mark different sections that are
relevant to one or more themes. The text is then broken
down into meaningful pieces and labelled.
Step 4: Elaboration
Themes are explored more closely. The purpose is to
capture the nuances of meaning not captured by coding
alone. Coding and elaboration are carried out until no
further significant insights emerge.
Step 5: Interpretation and checking
This is the final step where the phenomenon that is
studied is put together. Thematic categories are used as
subheadings. Thematic analysis involves identifying the
common themes from the information and using excerpts from
the information to substantiate those themes (Rapmund,
2005).
The researcher then goes through the interpretation
and looks for contradictions.
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Trustworthiness of Qualitative Research
Validity in qualitative research refers to research
that is plausible, credible and trustworthy (Burke, 2000).
Lincoln and Guba (1985) note that naturalistic
(qualitative) studies are accused of
being undisciplined;
that the qualitative researcher is guilty of
‘sloppy’
research and they (qualitative researchers) engage in
‘merely subjective’ observations, responding
indiscriminately to the ‘loudest bangs’ or the ‘brightest
lights’ (p. 289).
Lincoln and Guba (1985) argue against the use of the
following terms in qualitative studies: internal and
external validity, reliability, and objectivity. They
(Lincoln & Guba, 1985) demonstrate how inappropriate these
constructs are for qualitative inquiry. The following are
four alternative constructs that more accurately reflect
the assumptions of the qualitative paradigm (Lincoln & Guba
in de Vos, 2004, p. 351):
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Credibility
This is the alternative to internal validity, in which
the goal is to demonstrate that the inquiry is conducted in
such a manner as to ensure that the subject is accurately
identified and described. The ultimate test of internal
validity for the conventional (quantitative) inquirer is
the extent to which the findings of an inquiry display an
isomorphism (a one-to-one relationship) with that reality
(Lincoln & Guba, 1985, p. 294). But the determination of
such isomorphism is in principle impossible, as the
enquirer would need to know the nature of that ultimate
tangible reality a priori. It is the nature of that reality
that is at issue; if one already ‘knew’ it there would be
no need to mount an inquiry to determine it (Lincoln &
Guba, 1985, p. 395).
According to Lincoln and Guba (1985, p. 295), the test
of isomorphism is, therefore, in principle impossible to
apply within the conventional paradigm, but it is the best
method of choice for the naturalist. To be able to
demonstrate ‘truth value’, the naturalist must show that he
or she has represented these multiple constructions
adequately; that is, that the reconstructions that have
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been arrived at via the inquiry are credible to the
constructors of the original multiple realities (Lincoln &
Guba, 1985).
Lincoln and Guba (1985) assert that the implementation
of a credibility criterion is twofold. To carry the inquiry
in such a way that the probability that the findings will
be found to be credible is enhanced and, secondly, to
demonstrate the credibility of the findings by having them
approved by the constructors of the multiple realities
being studied. Participants in this study are given
summaries of the interviews in order to confirm the
accuracy of the stories; that is, they have to approve the
researcher’s construction of the study’s multiple
realities. After reading the summaries, the participants
confirmed my interpretation of their stories as being a
true reflection. Stiles (1993, p. 605) calls this process
‘iteration’, which involves a movement between
interpretation and observation.
Transferability
This is the alternative to external validity or
generalisability, in which the burden of demonstrating the
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applicability of one set of findings to another context
rests more with the investigator who would make the
transfer, than with the original investigator.
Transferability is achieved by producing detailed and rich
descriptions of contexts. These give readers detailed
accounts of the structures of meanings which develop in a
specific context. These understandings can then be
transferred to new contexts in other studies to provide a
framework with which to reflect on arrangements of meaning
and action that occur in these new contexts (Terre Blanche
& Derrheim, 1999, p. 63).
Dependability
This is the alternative to reliability, in which the
researcher attempts to account for changing conditions in
the phenomenon chosen for the study. Dependability refers
to the degree to which the reader can be convinced that
the findings did indeed occur as the researcher says they
did. Dependability is achieved through rich and detailed
descriptions that show how certain actions and opinions
are rooted in, and develop out of, contextual interaction
(Terre Blanche & Durrheim, 1999, p. 64). In this study, I
will ground my interpretation of the text by linking it to
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passages from the original text and the context in which
interaction occurred.
Confirmability
This captures the traditional concept of objectivity.
Lincoln and Guba (1985) argue that confirmability removes
the emphasis from the investigator (it is no longer his or
her objectivity that is at stake), and places it where it
ought more logically to be: on the data itself (p. 300).
The issue is no longer the investigator’s characteristics,
but the characteristics of the data. Stiles (1993) states
that observations cannot be repeated exactly, no matter how
closely procedures are specified. Therefore, readers would
need the original material to confirm the interpretations.
To the extent that it is ethical and feasible, the data as
well as the process of gathering and interpreting it are
open to inspection (Stiles, 1993, p. 606).
Because in qualitative research the researcher is
personally involved in information collection and
interpretation, research bias tends to occur. Research bias
takes place when there is selective observation and
selective recording of information and also when one allows
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one's personal views and perspective to affect the way data
is interpreted.
To deal with this issue of research bias, the
researcher employs a strategy referred to as reflexivity,
which means that the researcher is critically selfreflexive about her potential biases and predispositions
(Burke, 2000). This involves discussing personal background
and how this may affect the current study.
Ethical Issues
According to Terre Blanche & Durrheim (1999), there
are three ethical principles that have to be upheld in
research: autonomy, nonmaleficence, and beneficence.
The
autonomy principle requires the researcher to respect the
autonomy of all persons participating in the study. This
includes being granted the voluntary and informed written
consent of participants, ensuring the freedom of
participants to withdraw from the study at any time, and
respecting the participants’ anonymity in any publication
that might arise out of the study.
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The principle of nonmaleficence means that the
research should do no harm to the research participants.
The researcher considered potential risks that the research
might inflict on the participants, be these social,
emotional or physical. This study could evoke painful
memories relating to the loss of the spouse; therefore, the
researcher was sensitive towards the feelings of the
participants.
Debriefing was done to create the space for the
participants to work through the experiences that were
evoked by the nature of the questions asked during the
study. Debriefing is one way of minimizing the harm that
may have occurred as a result of the study (Strydom, 2005).
I asked the participants how they felt after the interview
in order to find out how they were affected by the
interview. All four of the participants said that they
found that talking about their lost spouses helped them.
The three participants whose wives had been dead for six
months and less wanted to talk more about their loss and
they said they found it different to be talking to someone
who was not part of their family or friends.
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The interview appeared to serve as a catharsis for the
participants and it gave them the opportunity to release
emotions and to discuss matters which troubled them, but
which they could not ordinarily discuss with others. For
instance, one of the fathers spoke at length about his
frustrations with his step-son.
None of the participants
was in therapy at the time of the interview, and yet they
said that they were starting to heal from the loss of their
spouses.
The principle of beneficence requires the researcher
to design the research such that it will be of benefit, if
not directly to the research participants, then more
broadly to the other researchers or the society at large.
This study aims to benefit society in that it will assist
in creating new meanings of single parents in general, and
single fathers in particular.
The next chapter introduces the participants and
discusses the interviews. Emerging themes from each
participant will be discussed and later a summary of the
four participants’ themes will be interrogated. Thereafter,
reflections of the researcher concerning the process of the
interviews will be offered.
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CHAPTER 5
INTERVIEWS
Presentation of the interviews
Presented here are the four ‘stories’ of four single
widowers, two Black and two White. The interviews were
unstructured and focused on the experiences of widowers as
single fathers. All interviews were audio-taped and then
transcribed. Each participant received a copy of summaries
of the transcripts and was asked to check my interpretation
of the interviews to ensure accuracy.
A brief overview of our initial contact and my
perception of the ambiance of the interview will be
presented. I will then give an overview of the person,
including some basic background information. The family
genogram will be drawn to give more information about the
family that is being discussed. This will be followed by a
description of the actual interview, and the emerging
themes will then be considered. After giving an individual
presentation of the interviews, I will then give a
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collective interpretation of the four interviews, linking
this with the literature review. A short description of
what genograms are follows:
GENOGRAMS
A genogram is a format for drawing a family tree that
records information about family members and their
relationships over at least three generations. Genograms
display family information graphically in a way that
provides a quick gestalt of complex family patterns and a
rich source of hypotheses as to how a clinical problem may
be connected to the family context and the evolution of
both problem and context over time (McGoldrick & Gerson,
1985, p. 1).
Multigenerational triangles are likely to develop if
one parent dies or leaves because of divorce or separation.
In this study, genograms will be used to illustrate any
changes in alliances that occurred after the death of the
spouse. One of the most common patterns takes place when a
single parent and her children share a household with their
parents (McGoldrick & Gerson, 1985). The single parent may
lose power as the grandparents take over child-rearing
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responsibilities, or as a grandparent-grandchild alliance
forms against the parent (McGoldrick & Gerson, 1985).
The physical, social, and emotional functioning of
family members is profoundly interdependent, with changes
in one part reverberating in other parts of the system.
According to McGoldrick and Gerson (1985), the adaptive
efforts of members of the system reverberate through many
levels of the system … from the biological to the
intrapsychic to the interpersonal; that is, from the
nuclear and extended family, community, culture and beyond.
An introduction to Mr Mathe
Mr Mathe was recommended to me by the oncology social
worker. The social worker made the initial contact with
him. I telephoned Mr Mathe to introduce myself, and to
explain further what the study was about. When I
telephoned, he sounded distracted and it seemed as if he
was driving as traffic sounds were audible. He said he was
willing to take part in the study. We made the appointment
for the interview. He wanted the interview to be done
during office hours at his place of work. His secretary
phoned me after three days to confirm the appointment.
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MR MATHE’S GENOGRAM
47 yrs
36
yrs
Mr Mathe
Chief Director
Married for 6 years
Mrs Mathe; Lab technician
10 yrs
5
yrs
Lebogang
Ipeleng
Figure 1: Before Mrs Mathe’s death
47 yrs
Mr Mathe
Chief Director
Mrs Mathe
Died 3 months ago; had cancer
10 yrs
5
yrs
Ipeleng
Lebogang
Figure 2: After Mrs Mathe’s death
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Background information
Mr Mathe is 47 years old and is a chief director
working for a military institution. He stays in the suburbs
of a big city with his two children, a five-year-old
daughter and a ten-year-old son. He is not the biological
father to his son; his late wife had a relationship with
another man before Mr Mathe met her and she and the other
man had a son together. Thabo, the son, was not officially
adopted by Mr Mathe, but he treats him and refers to him as
his son. Mrs Mathe died three months ago after a short
illness.
The interview
The interview took place at 14h40 and took about 70
minutes. The time that we agreed upon for the appointment
was shifted to a later time on the same day. When I arrived
at his office, he was out of the office busy with something
and I had to wait for him for about ten minutes. I felt
very awkward and nervous before the interview started.
Perhaps this was due to the fact that the environment was
very formal and intimidating. He led me into his huge
office.
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We sat at a smaller table which seemed to be the one
he used when interviewing or having meetings with clients.
He introduced himself as Mr Mathe. He appeared to be
uncomfortable before the interview started: I suppose,
perhaps, that discomfort was due to my own state of
discomfort. As soon as the interview started and I relaxed,
he also appeared more comfortable. He spoke freely about
his experiences and he kept on talking even after the audio
tape was switched off at the end of the interview.
Themes emerging from Mr Mathe’s interview
Control and helplessness
The theme of control is dominant throughout Mr Mathe’s
story. His type of work requires that he always be in
control. He works in a military setting which is
traditionally a very authoritative and controlling context.
He occupies a high position in his work. He was the one who
was always in control in his house when his wife was still
alive and he controlled the relationship between his late
wife and her family. When asked if his wife’s family was
closer to his nuclear family he said:
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Yes, but her family … they tried to get closer with
her but I always tried to say that our things are our
things and our decisions, and she learned that.
It seems that he unilaterally decided how his family
should be run, and that his wife did not have much choice
but to agree to this. He was very disappointed and felt
betrayed by his wife when she decided to have her mother
around when she was dying. He felt that his mother-in-law
did not belong there with his wife. He stated:
I felt that I was the one who was supposed to be there
and not her mother because we were always together and
the mother-in-law was not there. We have been married
for five years, so for six years she was not in the
picture.
Even when his wife was dying he still wanted to
control the relationship between mother and daughter. The
fact that his wife insisted on having her mother there all
the time might have made him feel helpless. He is used to
things working out his way, but now he finds himself having
to play second fiddle to his mother-in-law.
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He was very frustrated and felt helpless when his wife
was ill and did not know what caused the illness. That was
a very uncomfortable position for him as there was nothing
he could do. They had to go home and wait for the doctor to
contact them as soon as the doctor got the test results. He
tried to maintain some sort of control over the wife’s
illness by looking for information on the internet
regarding the type of cancer that his wife had and what
other treatment options there were.
Mr Mathe’s need for control is also seen in his
relationship with the lady that helps with the household
chores. It seems that since he was not able to control his
wife’s illness, he tries to over-compensate by making sure
that the helper’s health is under his scrutiny. He
commented about his involvement in the helper’s health
status:
I know that I am not a woman but if she has problems
she must tell me and talk to me otherwise I will not
know when she wants help. I always tell her that if
you are a woman you must always do tests like HIV and
some other ‘women things’.
104
From the above comment it seems as if he holds himself
responsible for the helper’s health. Perhaps he feels that
if he was vigilant enough he might have been able to
prevent what happened to his wife; the cancer might have
been diagnosed earlier and his wife might still be alive.
Mr Mathe’s reluctance to seek help from the extended
family also appears to be his way of making sure that he is
in control of what is happening in his house. He perceives
help from others as threatening his control over his house
and children. He was disappointed when Mrs Mathe’s family
said that they were sorting out the issue of his son with
the son’s biological father. He felt that it was his duty
to sort it out himself and the grandparents had no right to
do that for him.
Not being in control may be perceived by Mr Mathe as a
sign of weakness. He is presently in a vulnerable position
regarding the custody court case with his late wife’s son’s
biological father. For Mr Mathe there are only challenges
in life and not problems, but it sounds as though he
realizes that the situation with the son may be a problem
since he has no control over what the outcome will be: the
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court has the controlling and deciding power. The fact that
his in-laws are supportive of the biological parent seems
to make him more helpless regarding the custody of the son.
Maintaining the illusion that he is coping well with
work and the children might be a manoeuvre to control how
his employer perceives him. His employer thinks that he is
coping well because his work is always up to date, but Mr
Mathe knows that he is not coping. He goes back to work in
the evenings to keep his work up to date. He says that one
needs to keep up and there is no room for saying ‘I am not
coping’.
The interview set-up also confirmed Mr Mathe’s
apparent need to be in control. We met for the interview at
his work place where he feels in control; I had to go
through his secretary. He maintained the authoritative
position right until the start of the interview. Perhaps
that was due to the nature of the topic to be discussed.
For someone in his position, to acknowledge to a stranger,
who is a woman, that he is not coping must have been
difficult.
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Mr Mathe’s relentless need for control is seen in his
relationship with his acquaintances. His friends meet with
him on his terms only. He says: “If someone wants to see me
and spend time with me he must come to me”. He realized
that to make everything run smoothly in his life without
the help of his wife he cannot afford not to be on top of
things. He runs his life like a well oiled machine and he
sets boundaries in terms of how he spends his time outside
his nuclear family. For him, his children come first.
The controlling theme seems to have positive outcomes
for this family. Control is used as a tool in adjusting to
the single-parent status. For someone with a controlling
interactional style, the way in which his wife died might
have caused him discomfort. He then reacted to the
discomfort in the only way he knows how, which involves
even more control.
Aiming to be a ‘perfect father and mother’
The theme of aiming to be a ‘perfect father and
mother’ represents the enormous burden that Mr Mathe
carries. He never allows himself to be wrong or perceived
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as inadequate in his new role of single parenting. He tries
his utmost to be the best parent for his children even if
this is not practical. He claims to discuss every issue
with his children and he tries to involve them in decision
making. He has utopian ideas on how an ideal parent should
be and tries by all means to fit this profile. By doing so,
he is putting himself under a lot of pressure, as he does
not accept help from others since this might be construed
as a sign of not being a perfect parent. He feels that by
not doing what his late wife used to do in the house will
be a sign of not being ‘perfect’ in his new role.
Trying to be the perfect father and mother involves
adopting both his late wife’s and his own role. His wife
did the cooking and never put the responsibility on the
helper regarding child-rearing duties. He is also doing the
same; he does not want the helper to cook for them because
that might mean that he is abdicating carrying out his late
wife’s duties. He comments about his responsibility as a
parent to do everything for his family:
I just want to say that a lot of men out there should
take it upon themselves. Should this happen, they
should be ready to take the fight to look after the
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children. Not only the children, the house and look
after yourself …
challenges will always come; I say
challenges because you can overcome those
challenges … but you don’t step away from the
children; make sure you are always there for them.
From the above comment, there is no room in Mr Mathe’s
mind for failing as a parent. He feels that as a parent you
should not strive simply to be the best you can: you should
try to be the ultimate parent. Much guilt is aroused when
he finds himself not being the perfect father and mother.
He says that he tends to be very harsh to the children and
wishes that he had someone who could teach and guide him.
He perceives himself as doing better than most parents
who are ‘double’. As a perfect parent, Mr Mathe hopes for
perfect children: he says that his daughter will learn to
be independent and he is already teaching her to be
responsible. His discomfort seems to be with the son
because, unlike the daughter who is open and talks a lot
about her mother, the son is not talking. He says: “That
worries me; I think that later he may explode because he is
not talking”. For the first time in the interview he
acknowledged the fact that he needs help. He said:
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I and the kids are supposed to see a psychologist
about the loss …
Maybe a psychologist will help him
talk about his mother. You see I don’t know if what I
am doing with the kids is ok because no one is telling
me that.
Mr Mathe seems to demonstrate a strong need to always
do the right thing. He wants to make the right decisions
and to ensure that he has control over how his family is
run.
Isolation
Mr Mathe seems to have built a wall around himself and
his nuclear family. His dislocation from his family of
origin over a long period appears to have contributed to
his isolation. Extended family members are perceived as
being interfering, rather than as being a support system
for him. He says that: “if you stay with extended family
members you now adopt other problems”. Regarding his
extended family, he adds: “... family is not something that
is close to my heart; em ... I managed on myself”.
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The children are also taught by their father to
isolate themselves from their grandparents. It appears as
if the daughter is a good student so far because she never
wants to visit her aunts or uncles, even if Mr Mathe goes
away on business trips. Mr Mathe’s isolation seems to be
fuelled by his distrust of family. He seems to isolate
himself as a way of protecting himself from his extended
family. This comment demonstrates his feelings:
... you know traditionally our people, the African
people, they always talk. So if you are close to this
thing ... these are the people that will hurt you.
The isolation theme is linked to the theme of control.
Mr Mathe’s isolation seems to be a way of trying to
maintain control in his life. If the extended family is
excluded from his nuclear family, there will not be any
threat to his control. He says:
It is better to get someone who comes in, you pay
them and they go. So if you are not happy they can
go ... I cut the assistance from families from the day
after the funeral.
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It is safer for him to relate with people who do not
have familial bonds to him because then he can decide when
to terminate the bond. He says that family members can
never be shaken off once they become too close. He was very
close to his wife and everything was ‘centralized’ around
his wife, and he says that when she died everything ‘went
back’. He found himself alone again. He is now trying to
keep his children for himself.
There is a disconnection from the extended family, but
a strong connection between him and the children. He spends
his days either at work or with the children. Mr Mathe does
not seem to have close friends with whom he connects.
Mr Mathe’s response to the interview summaries
Mr Mathe said that the summaries were a true
reflection of what he said in the interview. He was
surprised to see how isolated his family is and stated that
he was aware of his distrust of others, but did not realize
the extent to which this was the case. It was painful to
see how he had denied his children the connection they
needed from outside his nuclear family. He says that he
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thinks his children need to be with him so that he can
protect them.
Researcher’s reflections on the interview
Before the interview started I felt a bit intimidated
by the interview setting; that is, his occupation, the
place where the interview was taking place, the type of
topic and the fact that he was the first participant that I
interviewed for this study. I think I was most
uncomfortable about the fact that he lost his wife three
months ago and felt that unlike in a therapeutic context
where clients decide to speak to the therapist about their
lost loved ones, I chose him to speak to me. Although he
voluntarily took part in the study, I could not help
feeling that I had no right asking him about his widowed
experiences, especially so soon after his wife died.
I left the interview feeling sad and sorry for Mr
Mathe. He seemed to try too hard to protect himself from
everyone and I wondered what it was about himself that he
was protecting. I also left the interview session feeling
just how society generalizes the Ubuntu concept, which
means that I am because you are, as being something that
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all Blacks share. Society tends to assume that Black people
are less isolated than Whites. Mr Mathe seemed so alone at
a time when he could have benefited so much from people
around him. I understand that at the time the isolation to
which Mr Mathe was exposing himself and his family was
serving a function. For him being alone means being able to
control what is happening around him. Perhaps that also
means that if he is away from people that care about him
they will not see how much he is hurting.
An introduction to Marko
Marko was recommended to me by the oncology social
worker. She made the initial telephone contact. She said to
me that Marko was very eager to be part of this study. I
telephoned Marko to introduce myself and explain the nature
of the study. The telephone conversation was very awkward
as it seemed as if Marko did not understand or hear well
what I was saying. The initial conversation was in English
and it seemed as if Marko found it difficult to respond. I
thought that perhaps this was due to the fact that he felt
uncomfortable speaking English because he had a very strong
Afrikaans accent; perhaps he struggled to express himself.
I started speaking Afrikaans to him and the conversation
114
was better. Marko said that he was willing to take part in
the study. He said that he would be comfortable to have the
interview done at his house. The appointment was made for
the next week at his house after work, which was around
17h30.
MARKO VOSLOO’S GENOGRAM
32 yrs
32
yrs
Marko
IT Specialist
Married for 8 years
4 yrs
Jannie
Figure 3: Before Corrie’s death
115
Corrie
Insurance
Consultant
33 yrs
Marko
IT Specialist
Corrie
Died 7 months ago; had cancer
4 yrs
Jannie
Figure 4: After Corrie’s death
Background information
Marko Vosloo is a thirty-three years old White widower
whose wife died six-and-a-half months ago. He stays in a
townhouse complex with his mother and his son, Jannie, who
is 4 years of age. He met his wife at university and they
were married for nine years. Marko’s wife died of cancer.
She was sick for three-and-a-half years. His wife, Corrie,
was diagnosed with cancer when their son was seven months
116
old. Marko is the younger of two sons. His mother is
presently staying with him and his son. Marko works for an
information technology company as an IT (information
technology) specialist.
The Interview
The interview took place at his house in the late
afternoon at 17h45. When I arrived, he and his son came out
to the driveway to welcome me to their house. The son was
relaxed and he started telling me how his day was at the
crèche. Marko was responding warmly to the son. Marko made
me feel comfortable from the beginning, and my anxiety
about the interview was immediately dispelled. The house
was very welcoming and felt homely. His mother was in the
kitchen and it seemed like she was preparing dinner. As we
were sitting in the lounge, Marko’s mother asked Jannie,
Marko’s son, to come with her so that Daddy could talk with
me. We sat on the same couch and the audio-tape was placed
between us.
The interview lasted for 65 minutes. Marko’s mother
offered us drinks in the middle of the interview. The
conversation with Marko was very relaxed and there were
117
several instances where there was a lot of laughing. Even
though Marko was very calm when narrating his story about
Corrie, there were times when there was so much sadness in
his voice. He would speak softer and the pain was so
tangible. He would then start to lighten up and the
conversation became less serious. The change in his mood
seemed to be showing the process he is going through at the
moment; he is at times sad when he thinks of Corrie, but
then he realizes that life must go on and he must be strong
for the sake of Jannie.
Themes emerging from Marko’s interview
Responsibility
This theme was evident throughout the text where Marko
was talking about his new role. He says that the most
difficult challenge as a single parent was his awareness of
the responsibility that faced him. He feels responsible
towards Jannie because he believes that it is important
that his son gets the best so that he becomes the best
child. Therefore, he feels that if Jannie is to be the best
child, then he has to be a model father. Marko derives
118
satisfaction from the knowledge that Jannie is perceived by
others as well-behaved. He says:
… dan voel ek goed. Jy weet as hy iets doen wat goed
is dan voel jy … I am doing something right.
That responsibility of being the best parent induces
some anxiety in Marko. He worries that he is perhaps too
harsh at times. He says sometimes he wonders if he is doing
the right thing. He remarks: “Bederf ek hom nou; jy weet jy
worry nou die hele tyd”. It appears as if it is important
for him that Jannie turns out to be a well-behaved child.
Regardless of his mother being there to help him,
Marko took his new role seriously. He knew that it was his
responsibility, not his mother’s, to make sure that Jannie
was taken care of. He says that everyone is really helping,
but he remains responsible. It was difficult to adjust to
the new responsibility in the first few months. He states:
... die paar maande na Corrie dood is, veral
onmiddelik na die dood het ek partykeer opgestaan en
gedink. I don’t know how I am going to do this ... it
119
was n baie confusing tyd gewees, veral die eerste drie
maande...
Marko missed the shared responsibility he had with
Corrie. He says that people marry for a reason which for
him means to help each other with parenting duties. He was
involved in caring for Jannie while Corrie was alive, as
most of the time she was very weak, especially after she
had chemotherapy; but still the fact that Corrie was not
there to give him emotional support was difficult. This
lone parenting is still strange to him. He says that if he
knew that Corrie would get cancer they would not have had a
child.
Marko also feels that he needs to make the loss of
Corrie less painful for the others. He did not want to
burden his in-laws with the responsibility of helping him
arrange the funeral. His father-in-law is a church
minister; therefore, he could have helped him or given him
advice on funeral arrangements, but he felt that it was his
responsibility to do this. He says:
... it was horrible om die diens te reël. Ek het nie
geweet hoe nie ... ek kan nie vir hulle vra om te help
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nie ... hulle kind is dood.
Marko’s need to be a responsible parent poses some
conflict in maintaining the balance between being someone
who gives Jannie love and someone who maintains discipline.
He says:
… elke kind het n ouer nodig wat sagter is en n ouer
was meer harder is. Een hou die discipline en die
ander een gee die liefde en drukkies. Nou besef ek nou
maar … ek moet die discipline gee en steeds die selfde
kant ma wees.
Marko finds it difficult to maintain that balance
between being a giver of love and the one who maintains
discipline. He wants to give Jannie ‘liefde en drukkies’,
but on the other hand he does not want him to be spoilt. He
prides himself on being someone who has done good work in
parenting Jannie so far. He says about Jannie’s good
manners:
Dit is die belangrikste ding vir my op die
oomblik; dis baie rewarding as hy sulke goed doen
of iemand dit agterkom en sê.
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Marko pointed out that the most difficult part of
single parenting is maintaining the balance between
discipline and love. For someone like Marko who feels
responsible for his child’s well being, being unable to
maintain the balance between giving love and maintaining
discipline is stressful.
Keeping things the same
Marko strives to keep things as they were when Corrie
was alive. This seems to be evident in how he is raising
Jannie. He says that he feels that things should stay the
same so that Jannie is not confused. I get the idea that
the need to keep things the same is not only beneficial for
Jannie, but also helps Marko to cope with his new role.
Marko’s need for constancy in parenting for Jannie
does not leave much room for faults. It is very important
for him that the rules that they (he and Corrie) decided on
are followed. Sticking to the rules that were set by both
him and Corrie makes the loss of his wife less obvious and
perhaps that is his way of making peace with Corrie’s
death. His insistence on constancy in the rules and
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routines helps Marko cope with his new role. For this
family keeping things the same is essential in the
maintenance of homeostasis in their family system. Marko’s
commentary on the importance of constancy in Jannie’s life
is:
Toe Corrie nog geleef het toe het ons gesê hier is die
reëls. Daar is mos rede hoekom daar reëls is, en daar
die reëls staan nog. Hy weet die enigste ding wat
verander het is dat mamma nie hier meer nie. Maar die
wêreld is nog dieselfde, my reëls is nog dieselfde en
my pa is nog dieselfde. Ek wil graag hê hy moet my
sien soos voor mamma dood is … Hy moet sien dat
eintlik
pa is nog dieselfde. Well ek stress met tye
want dis nie maklik nie.
Even in the midst of Marko’s striving for sameness in
his relationship with Jannie, there are changes that have
been adopted. Marko and Jannie have developed this ritual
where he tells his son about mommy. Almost every night
after Bible reading and praying, the two narrate to each
other stories about Corrie. Marko says he thinks that
Jannie is scared that he might forget his mother. It seems
that in telling the story to Jannie he is not only keeping
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the memory of Corrie alive for Jannie, but also for
himself. The special time spent with Jannie every evening
evokes happy memories of Corrie for Marko. He was smiling
when he told me how he would tell Jannie about the things
that Corrie liked.
Family routines and rituals are those behaviours and
practices adopted and maintained by families to orient and
organize family life into predictable patterns of living
(McCubbin in Moriarty & Wagner, 2004, p. 195). Moriarty and
Wagner (2004) add that the importance that families attach
to these practices promotes family unity and stability.
Connectedness and isolation
The theme of connectedness is evident in the way Marko
relates to his extended family and his in-laws. The way
Marko and the researcher connected served as a sample of
how he reaches out to people and how effortless it is for
people to want to connect with him. There is no sense of
desperation or helplessness in the way he connects with
people. He acknowledges the mutual function of connecting.
His connection with friends and family is not only useful
for his healing, but also for those who loved and were
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closer to Corrie. The following statement illustrates how
connecting with others is perceived by Marko as mutually
beneficial:
As iemand aanbied om vir jou iets te doen, gebruik
dit.Dit help nie net vir jou maar ook vir daardie
mense wat voel hulle het iets prakties gedoen. Onthou
hull gaan ook deur die proses.
Marko’s connection with his friends is also a source
of isolation. He still gets invitations to dinner from his
friends, but he feels isolated from them in the sense that
the connection he had with them was lost when Corrie died.
He now connects with his friends on a different level, that
is, as a single father and not as a couple with Corrie. He
says that being in the company of his friends without
Corrie feels uncomfortable. Some of his friends do not know
how to relate to him when they are with their wives. He
comments:
Gewoonlik het jy saam met n sekere klomp gesit en
kuier en Corrie het saam met n ander klomp gesit en
kuier. Julle het darem almal gesit en praat, nou voel
jy jy moet met hierdie klomp praat en dan met daardie
125
klomp praat. Jy is so half … as hulle praat oor wat n
man en vrou … wat hulle doen … of wat ever, dan begin
ek aan Corrie dink. Dan voel jy nie lekker.
Marko’s response to the interview summaries
Marko made one editorial correction, I wrote ‘she’
instead of ‘he’. He said that otherwise the summary
represented what he said in the interview. He also
corrected the paragraph where I said that Corrie was in and
out of hospital for chemotherapy. He said that she went to
hospital due to complications from chemotherapy.
Researcher’s reflections on the interview
Interviewing Marko was comfortable and it almost felt
as though I had known him for a long time. I expected Marko
to be aloof because when I phoned to make the appointment
he seemed distant. I thought that he would feel
uncomfortable to tell a stranger about his struggles as a
single parent. Perhaps that was due to the fact that the
setting was so homely. We sat in the lounge area and I
could smell the food cooking in the kitchen. We sat on the
same sofa with the audiotape between us. The seating
126
arrangement possibly made the interview seem more like a
friendly chat.
Marko is a perceptive, gentle man. My use of the word
‘gentle’ does not imply any lack of strength, but indicates
a quality of humble, quite strength and sensitivity to his
fellow human beings. He feels comfortable with every aspect
of parenting, and although the single parent role is not
without costs, he feels confident in his ability to deal
with it.
Introduction to Matt
Matt was also recommended to me by the oncology social
worker. I telephoned Matt to introduce myself and the
topic. He said that he was willing to take part in the
study. We made arrangements for the interview. He said that
he would be comfortable to have the interview at his house.
The interview could not be in the afternoon or evenings as
that time was his time with his daughter. We agreed on
having the interview at 13h00.
127
MATT HENNING’S GENOGRAM
40 yrs
35
yrs
Matt,
marketing
Kimberley,
Consultant
Married for 12 years
11
yrs
Emily
Figure 5: Before Kimberly’s death
40 yrs
Matt
Kimberley
Died 6 months ago; had cancer
11
yrs
Emily
Figure 6: After Kimberly’s death
128
Background information
Matt Henning is a 40-year-old White father of a 10year-old daughter, Emily. Emily will turn 11 the day after
the interview with Matt. He stays in a townhouse complex
situated in an affluent part of the city. He is renting the
house and is planning to buy it soon. His wife, Kim, died
six months ago from leukaemia. She was diagnosed with
leukaemia 21 months before she died. Kim was successful in
her work and earned a good salary. He works for a marketing
company and spends a lot of time travelling.
The interview
The interview took place at his home at 13h00 and took
50 minutes. He came out to show me where to park the car.
He was warm and welcoming and he asked me what language I
preferred to speak. I told him that speaking English was
easier but that I did not mind speaking Afrikaans. He has
an Afrikaans surname but he is English-speaking. He was
relieved to discover that we would be talking English. When
I made the appointment, I spoke with him Afrikaans as I
assumed that he was Afrikaans-speaking.
129
He was alone at home and he offered me something to
drink. In the kitchen there was washing hanging on a
washing drier. The house was clean and had a masculine
touch to it. We went upstairs and sat in the lounge for the
interview. The audiotape was placed on the table and we sat
facing each other on separate couches.
Matt and I were relaxed during the interview. Talking
about Kim seemed to be all right and he was not embarrassed
to tell me about his difficulties of single parenting. The
interview seemed to continue after the audiotape was
switched off. He was concerned about the next day because
it was Emily’s birthday. He was not sure how it was going
to be for the two of them since it would be her first
birthday without her mother.
Themes emerging from Matt’s interview
Helplessness
This theme refers to Matt’s need to be ‘cuddled’ and
rescued by significant others in his life. He seems to be
struggling to cope on his own and tends not to trust
himself as a single parent. He was doing the parenting
130
alone before his wife died but now feels inadequate to do
so. The following comment reveals how he feels about the
new role of single parenting:
Throughout the 21-month period that she had the
disease here were days that I had to be a single
parent because she was in hospital for great lengths
of time, sometimes for a month and sometimes for two
weeks depending on the treatment. So it did not hit me
on the day she died; it did not take me by surprise …
The feeling of inadequacy may be as a result of him
still feeling so lost and alone without Kim. He says he is
not the type of person who survives on his own. The feeling
of inadequacy he has about himself makes him lose sight of
the fact that he has resources within himself to perform
well as a single father. Perhaps the strong sense of
helplessness that is evident in Matt’s story is mostly
related to the mourning process.
Matt gets a lot of empathy from his mother since she
went through the same thing as he did. Matt’s father died
when he was the same age as his daughter so there may be
some sort of transference from the mother. This fear from
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the mother that Matt might struggle with lone parenting may
be causing ‘single parent anxiety’, which immobilizes him.
He acknowledges the fact that he needs to do parenting on
his own.
Matt has some ambivalence towards the help that he is
getting. He is overwhelmed by all the responsibilities of
lone parenting, but on the other hand he says that he needs
to be a parent to Emily alone. The ambivalence gives one
the impression that he is saying: “help me I can’t do it
alone” and in the same breath he is saying: “don’t help me
I can do it alone”.
Isolation versus support
Matt seems to find himself continuously caught between
feeling isolated and feeling supported. His family of
origin and his mother-in-law have been very supportive. His
employer also understands his situation and allows him to
go home earlier so that he is at home when Emily comes home
from school. The church also plays a very important role at
this time because he always knows that he could just ask
anyone if he needs help. On the other hand, Matt feels
isolated from his circle of friends. He says that it is
132
very difficult to go to functions because it is only him
there. This feeling of isolation is echoed in this
statement:
Everyone else is there with their husbands and wives;
I feel like a spare wheel in this picture and it is
difficult …
Matt’s family support also stirs up feelings of
isolation. The social gatherings and holidays spent
together with the family makes the absence of Kim so
noticeable. He seems to appreciate their support, but he
cannot help feeling isolated in a supportive environment.
It seems that it is usually when he is with friends and
family that he realizes that Kim is really gone and he is
alone. He says:
It feels so different than when my wife was there. I
feel very lonely. We used to camp and that sort of
thing; we are going to a camp in a few weeks time. It
is going to be difficult because my wife is not there.
On the other hand, Matt feels that being around family may
help:
133
… it is going to be our first Christmas alone this
year but we will have my mother, my mother-in-law, my
sister-in-law and others. So we will be together; I
hope that makes things easier.
Time available versus time needed
Matt feels that there is not enough time to do
everything since Kim died. These extra demands on his time
and energy keep the dual role ‘balancing act’ in the
forefront of his consciousness. He is constantly aware of
his daughter’s needs and the demands of his work. He
comments:
… I am a lot busier because I had to work and come
home and take care of my daughter.
He added:
… I can’t do it because there is so much to do at
night … I don’t have the time …
In terms of him not having time for himself he says:
134
I don’t have time for myself anymore like I had
before. Weekends I don’t go relax with my friends like
I used to, which is bad because there is always
something to do. For instance, I would be sitting and
watching TV and my daughter will come and ask me to
help with something. You don’t really get time to
relax as much as you would like to.
Emily takes first preference in Matt’s life, but his work
often requires the most of his time. He remarks:
… sometimes I have to go away for three to four times
a month … like next week, I have to go Knysna for two
weeks.
Although Matt finds it difficult to balance the two
roles, he is adjusting his lifestyle to accommodate the
additional parental demands. He acknowledges the fact he
needs help with babysitting Emily when he goes away on
business trips, but does not want his mother or mother-inlaw to take over his parenting role. He remarks:
135
… me and my daughter have to learn to cope on our own.
I can’t lean on her forever.
Matt further states:
I believe that my daughter and I need to carry on our
own. We are a family now … I have to sit with my
daughter and help her with homework, and that has been
a challenge.
Time is a precious commodity for Matt and there seems
not to be enough of it. The challenge for him is to balance
time spent with Emily with time for himself. The cliché
that goes, ‘so much to do and so little time’ seems to be
true for Matt. When arranging for this interview, he made
it clear to me that I could only see him during school time
as after school time is Emily’s time. This shows how Matt
has learnt to manage his time; he has time for Emily and
time for other things.
136
Matt’s response to the interview summaries
Matt said that the summaries were a true reflection of
what he said in the interview. He was surprised at how
accurate I was in identifying his helplessness at the time
of the interview. He said he was feeling really low at the
time and the fact that Emily was about to celebrate her
first birthday without her mother was stressing him.
Researcher’s reflections on the interview
When I left the interview session I felt like I wanted to
hold Matt in my arms as I would
a little boy who dropped
his ice cream and tell him ‘you will be OK’. He is big in
stature and confident-looking, but his vulnerability was
overwhelming.
Introduction to Mandla
Mandla was recommended to me by a friend. My friend
made the initial contact. I telephoned to explain what the
study was about and to schedule time for the interview if
he was willing to take part in the study. He said that he
137
was very busy at the moment with work-related issues but he
would call me back to tell me which day was suitable for
him to conduct the interview. He telephoned after two weeks
and the interview was scheduled for the following week.
MANDLA SITHOLE’S GENOGRAM
43 yrs
33
yrs
Mandla, manager
19 yrs
Thabo
Married for 10 years
16
yrs
Bontle
Figure 7: Before Thato’s death
138
10 yrs
Sipho
Thato, shop
assistant
49 yrs
Thato
Mandla
Died 6 years ago; had car accident
25 yrs
Thabo
16 yrs
22
yrs
Bontle
Sipho
Figure 8: After Thato’s death
Background information
Mandla Sithole is a 49-year-old Black widowed father
of three children. The first-born is a son who is now 25
years old, followed by a daughter of 22 years the last
child being a son of 16 years old. His wife died in 2000,
aged 33 years old. She died in an automobile accident. He
was also in the car together with two of his children. The
wife died in hospital, and he was in an intensive care unit
139
for two weeks. He stays with his children in the suburbs of
a neighbouring city. The elder son now works and the two
other children are still at school.
The interview
The interview took place at 13h00 and took about 60
minutes. The interview was conducted in a coffee shop in
the city where the interviewer lives. He stays in another
city and he insisted on driving through to Pretoria as he
did not want me to drive far and was also worried that I
might get lost in an unfamiliar place. He chose the place
and said that he would be comfortable, assuring me that he
would be happy with the interview being conducted in such a
public place. I met him at the door of the coffee house and
we went inside. Initially, it was a struggle to get a table
which was secluded and less noisy. Once we sat down and I
reintroduced myself and the topic, we forgot about the
setting. He did not seem to be disturbed by the fact that
there were waitresses walking past our table. The interview
seemed more like a conversation with someone over coffee.
He was relaxed from the beginning and that dispelled my
worries about the place in which we were having the
interview.
140
Themes emerging from Mandla’s interview
Disbelief
Throughout Mandla’s story, the theme of disbelief is
prominent. The circumstances leading to the death of his
wife made him not believe that she had died. He was with
her in the car, and to accept that she had died was
difficult for Mandla to accept. Even after six years he
still does not believe that his wife has died. One would
expect this feeling of disbelief to have subsided due to
the period of mourning, but it is still very strong. That
seems to be what is keeping this family ‘alive’. It allows
them to continue with life as before.
It seems as if the extended family, especially
Mandla’s wife’s family also do not believe that their
daughter had died. They still hope to see her when Mandla
and the children come to visit.
Mandla seems not to grasp how good a parent he has
been for his children since the death of his wife. He finds
it difficult to articulate his successes as a single
141
parent. He does not want to take credit for the way his
children have turned out. When asked how he rates himself
as a parent, he says:
I was lucky to have such good children and I want to
thank God also in helping me raise such good children.
Mandla knows that he is the one who actually put
energy and sacrifices into his children’s upbringing, but
he thinks that it is his late wife and God who are
partially responsible for his children’s parenting. He
says:
I think I did a good job, I can say that I made a
success of … like I succeeded. Like if I did not
succeed maybe one of my kids will be a delinquent.
Mandla believes that it is his wife who helps him with
decisions that have to be taken in the house, especially
where child-raising issues are concerned. He does not
believe that he has raised his children for six years on
his own. He states:
Sometimes when I don’t know what to do with the kids,
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I would go to our bedroom and ask her for help.
Protection
The theme of protection is encountered in situations
where Mandla’s nuclear family is confronted with the
reality of the loss of mother and wife. His children wanted
to protect their father from the time he was still in
hospital. The older son, who was 19 years old at the time
of his mother’s death, wanted his father to marry someone
who came to visit him in the hospital, in the hope of
protecting his father from the pain associated with his
mother’s death.
Mandla’s description of his relationship with his late
wife implies that they were inseparable; therefore, the son
feels that his father will be lost without their mother. It
seems as if the son has put aside his own pain and loss of
his mother and is focusing on his father’s welfare. The
first few months after their mother’s death, the children
wanted to make sure that their father was taken care of.
Mandla was still on sick leave recuperating from the
injuries sustained in the accident. He comments:
143
There were times when they did not even go out to play
with friends, they just stayed home with me … at the
time when my operation was not healed yet, they were
always around to help me.
The above comment shows how protective the children
were of the father. At that time their aunt was around to
help their father so they did not have to hang around him
all the time, but they did. Their good behaviour is also an
attempt from the children to protect their father. They did
not want their father to stress about them. He says:
To be honest with you, my children never gave me any
problems. They missed their mother at times but
because I was there it was not a problem …
He added that:
They are obedient and so on and they are such good
children. I was lucky to have such good children…
Mandla was also protected by his brother. His brother
took him to his (brother’s) house after he was discharged
from hospital and he always tried to make sure that Mandla
144
is protected from loneliness and pain by taking him to meet
his friends. Mandla says:
And my brother was always there when I needed him,
always there. He would come and fetch me from my house
so that I can relax with some of his friends, ja, I
would go and spend time with them; he would later take
me back home.
Mandla and his two younger children were with his late
wife in the car when she died; therefore, by keeping her
‘alive’ in his mind he is protecting himself from ‘survivor
guilt’. Perhaps he feels that he is to blame for the wife’s
death. If he keeps her alive that means that he is not
guilty or responsible for her death as she is not dead.
The theme of protection is also seen in the
relationship of Mandla and his extended family and in-laws.
He tries not to go to family gatherings because he does not
like seeing them uncomfortable due to the fact that his
wife is not there with him and the children. He says:
Going to family gatherings or parties alone is
145
difficult and painful. It is not easy and sometimes
you find that when we get out of the car without her
brings back all those painful memories. Even the way
the extended family members look at us you can see
that they feel sorry for us. It is like they feel very
uncomfortable and don’t know how to deal with us. So
most of the time I don’t even want to go to places
which remind me and other people of my wife. I feel
very uncomfortable.
This protectiveness for himself and others makes it
impossible for him to connect with people who loved his
wife, especially his late wife’s mother and siblings. The
comment below explains how painful it is for him to see the
hurt in his in-laws’ eyes when they see him and his
children:
You see the hurt when they see me and the children
only. It reminds them of their child. Sometimes some
of them cry when they see us.
Mandla’s nuclear family members seem to be very
protective of each other. Since the death of the mother and
wife they seem to always be together. From the Black
146
cultural perspective, children usually visit their
grandparents or aunts during school holidays, but Mandla’s
children never visited on their own; their father was
always with them and they never slept over. One gets the
impression that by not sleeping over the children want to
make sure that their father is fine. His refusal to allow
them to sleep over is also his way of making sure that his
children are all right.
Closeness and distance
Mandla says that being a single father has drawn him
closer to the children. His children were closer to the
mother than they were to him, and now he feels that he has
the privilege to get to know his children better. He
states:
… you see and they also connect differently with you.
They also learn to know what you like and what you
don’t … I also spend a lot of time at home … I also
made sure that I bought all of them cell phones so
that I can be able to contact them. Even when they are
playing outside the house I can contact them when I
need them specially if I am not home I can tell them
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if I got delayed so that they know where I am and so.
This theme is closely linked to the theme of
protection. The above comments show the link between the
two themes. Mandla’s brother is protecting him by being
closer to him all the time. His mother also stayed with him
for some time after the death of his wife and she kept on
visiting Mandla and his children for the first year after
the death to make sure that Mandla was coping well with the
loss of his wife.
Mandla feels that he needs to know where his children
are all the time and the same applies to him; he wants the
children to know all the time where he is and when he will
be coming home. He also says that being close to one’s
children allows one to know when there is something wrong.
He states:
You know by being close to your kids you know what
your kids like and what they don’t. Sometimes you find
that there is an atmosphere at home between the kids
and you are able to notice that. You are able to find
out what is bothering them and they say ‘so and so did
not do her dishes or so and so did that to me’.
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The theme of closeness is seen in Mandla’s present
‘relationship’ with his late wife. He goes about life as if
she is still alive. He wants to maintain that close
relationship even in her death. As far as Mandla is
concerned, his wife is still alive and she is involved in
their everyday decisions. Cognitively, Mandla knows that
his wife is dead, but his heart is telling a different
story. When I said to him that I get the sense that his
wife’s presence is still strong in his life he replied:
Yes, my wife is still there in the house. When I get
inside the house I know and I can feel that she is
there. Even though she is dead I don’t think that she
ever left us. Sometimes when I don’t know what to do
with the kids, I would go to our bedroom and ask her
to help me.
Mandla’s relationship with his partner seems to be
both close and distant. He says that his partner
understands that he is still ‘married’ to his dead wife. It
seems as if they are having an adulterous relationship, as
Mandla is still ‘married’.
He still refers to his bedroom
as ‘our bedroom’. It appears to me that Mandla has defined
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the relationship with his partner as close, but not too
close, as his late wife still occupies her position as his
wife.
The relationship between Mandla and his daughter is
closer than it is with his sons. Their closeness makes it
easier for him and the daughter to bridge the sex-role
model stereotype. He connects with his daughter on many
levels; they are able to talk about almost anything. He
says that his daughter is free with him. They discuss
things that she would have discussed with her mother if she
was still alive; she also asks him to buy her things that
women need like panties and sanitary towels. Their
closeness is made more intense by their shared need to talk
about her mother. The two boys have moved onto another
level in their relationship with their late mother; they
seem not to depend on her for advice, while Mandla and his
daughter still do.
Mandla’s response to the interview summaries
Mandla said that the summaries were a true reflection
of what he said during the interview. He says his daughter
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was surprised to see how they have kept their mother alive
for all these years.
SUMMARIES OF THE FOUR INTERVIEWS
Each widowed single father represented in this study
is uniquely different, yet there are threads of commonality
underlying their situation. As the four widowers described
their experiences as single parents, commonalities and
unconventional behaviours were noted in their integration
of work and family responsibilities.
The following themes dominated and were prominent
throughout all the participants’ interviews.
Adjustment to loss and loneliness
Three widowers lost their wives to cancer; the fourth
widower’s wife died in a car accident. The circumstances
leading to the death of the wife seem to have an effect on
how the widowers adjusted to the loss. To the extent that
there is time for appropriate preparation, one tends to
experience relatively less of an assault on one’s ability
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to cope than when the death is totally unexpected (Rando,
1988, p. 52). Marko seems to have made peace with the idea
that Corrie might not live long. He says that talking to
Corrie about the possibility that she might die helped in
the adjustment after her death. He feels very privileged in
the sense that the illness gave him a chance to talk to her
about her death. The loss and adjustments after the passing
of his spouse were made a little less painful by the fact
that he could plan his life without her before she died.
Matt also felt that knowing that Kim had cancer helped
in the adjustment. They never thought that she would die so
soon and Kim did not like talking about her dying, but she
prepared Emily in terms of women and girl issues. Even
though Matt’s mother and sister help him, when it comes to
questions around women he feels that Kim contributed a lot.
That made life very easy for Emily and Matt. Rando (1988)
claims that unless the widower had time to anticipate and
rehearse new roles because of the length of the spouse’s
illness, he may have many new tasks to learn as he attempts
to get used to life without his companion.
Mr Mathe’s wife died after four weeks of being
diagnosed with cancer. There was no time for this family to
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come to terms with the idea that Mrs Mathe would not be
around for long. Mr Mathe, whose wife has been dead for
three months, struggles to come to terms with the loss of
his wife. Weizman and Kamm (1987) state that when the loss
has been sudden, it takes longer to recover. Mr Mathe also
seems to struggle in defining himself as a person without
his wife because she was a significant part of him. His
life revolved around his wife and he comments: “… I
centralized everything around the … me and my wife.
Suddenly everything went back”. Robertson and Utterback
(1986, p. 209) assert that if personal identity has been
closely linked with the marriage, if ‘the two have become
one’, as is the case with Mr Mathe, the task resembles
unscrambling an egg.
Mandla also struggles to accept the loss of his wife.
His wife died six years ago, but he does not believe that
she is gone and will not be coming back. It seems as though
the only way Mandla can cope with his new role is to
involve his late wife in the decisions that he makes for
instance, he would ask her advice on how to deal with some
problems. According to O’Neill and Mendelssohn (2001),
adjusting to single-parent status is a process that one
goes through by learning to cope with the new demands of
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their parenting roles and by establishing one’s identity as
a single person.
All four men miss their wives, and parenting their
children on their own is not easy, but they realize that
they have to move on for the sake of their children. Greif
(1990) and Christofferson (1998) add that widowers manage
to take care of their children just as well as other single
fathers and generally better than single mothers in the
same situation. Pollack (1995) argues that men’s nurturing
urge, often suppressed in boyhood and adult socialization
tasks could be stimulated dramatically by becoming single
fathers. Burgess (1995) adds that widowers are capable of
giving loving care to their children who need emotional and
physical support. Mr Mathe feels that he is doing well as a
single father. He says he thinks that he is better than
parents who are ‘double’.
These fathers may initially struggle to adjust to the
new role as they are still grappling with the loss of their
spouses, but, in time, they learn to cope (Greif, 1990).
It seems the loss that Matt feels at the moment makes it
difficult for him at times to connect to the one person to
whom he is most strongly
connected to, his daughter Emily.
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Situations and places where husband and wife used to
be together make the loss more intense. Mandla avoids
situations and places where he used to be with his wife
because it is too painful. Mr Mathe does not go anywhere;
he is either at work or with his children. His wife was his
life because, for him, family, meaning the extended family,
did not mean anything. It seems as though these widowers
struggle with their new identity which does not include
their late wives. Rando (1998, p. 135) claims that the
death of a spouse confronts one with the loss of a
significant part of one’s self; someone who was crucial in
helping one define one’s self and one’s world.
Marko says that for him it is the fact that he has to
take decisions about how to raise Jannie alone that he
finds difficult to deal with. He also comments on the fact
that a child has to have two parents and his loss of
Corrie’s advice regarding parenting is evident when Marko
talks about the challenges of single parenting.
The theme of loneliness is on a continuum which
fluctuates between feelings of lesser and greater
loneliness which occurs when the widowed fathers find
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themselves in situations or places which remind them of
their deceased wives and they experience feelings of being
supported by friends and family. Robertson and Utterback
(1986, p. 98) note that even when friends make an effort to
stay in touch, the newly single person often feels out of
place with the friends they knew as a couple, like the
proverbial ‘fifth wheel’.
Being the best parent
All four fathers perceive themselves positively as
parents; they see themselves as good parents. Belchman and
Carlson in Dowd (1997) found that two heterosexual parents
are not necessary for healthy cognitive, emotional or sexrole development in children. High quality parenting in
single-parent families can compensate for the lack of the
other parent (Belchman & Carlson in Dowd, 1997). These
fathers view their family and their parenting insights as
being better than those of two parents. Burgess (1985) adds
that widowed fathers find it less difficult to adjust to
the new role of sole parenting if they were involved in
child-rearing while the wives were still alive. All four
fathers were responsible in one way or another for caring
for their children before their wives died.
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The fathers have different ways of being the best
parent they can be for their children. For instance, Marko
keeps things the same and sticks to the routine that Jannie
knew when his wife was alive. For Mandla, knowing what is
happening with his children all the time is important. Mr
Mathe feels that his family needs to be together without
outside interference from the extended family members.
Matt, on the other hand, feels that he has to be
independent of his family because his nuclear family now
consists of him and Emily.
Having a good relationship with their children was
perceived by the four fathers as the positive part of being
single parents. They stated that it had been rewarding to
see how much closer they were to their children compared to
the time before the single-parent status. It has taken a
lot of work from the fathers to secure the closeness with
their children. Osherson (1997) maintains that fathers are
capable of being emotionally present in their families. The
fact that fathers can be more than breadwinners or
providers is viewed as one of the reasons why studies found
that widowed men cope better with lone parenting (Burgess,
1998; Greif, 1990; Monaghan-Leckband, 1978).
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Three of the fathers experienced discomfort and
conflict in their new roles as single parents. It is
sometimes the little things that prove to be the toughest
for single parents; for instance, some parents find it
difficult to combine the two roles, to be loving and
affectionate and also to be the disciplinarian (Shaw,
2005).
The fathers perceive themselves as being too harsh,
and their greatest challenge is to keep the balance between
giving love to their children and maintaining discipline.
Lamb (1997) indicates that the difficulty for fathers is
how to combine the contrasting images of authority and
intimacy into a coherent whole. Osherson (1995) notes that
the very definition of what it means to be a good father
has shifted from a predominant provider/breadwinner role to
more ambiguous expectations of emotional involvement and
responsiveness.
Despite the challenges that theses fathers experienced
as widowers and as single fathers, their families were
functional and what they did was consistent with the
structure of their family system. Lamb (1997) argues that
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there is no single father role to which all fathers should
aspire; rather, a successful father as defined in terms of
his children’s development is one whose role performance
matches the demands and prescriptions of his socio-cultural
and familial context.
It seems as if the fathers in this study were able to
deal with social messages or stereotypes regarding single
fatherhood and widowhood. Lund (2001) states that widowers
usually remarried as soon as possible after the death of
their spouse since it was a socially accepted solution to
single parenthood. Mandla has been widowed for six years
and he does not have plans to remarry soon. Marko says that
he will probably remarry but it would not be happening
soon. Even Matt who says that he is not capable of living
alone is not planning to remarry soon. Mr Mathe feels that
his children need all his attention now and he does not
want them to share him with someone now. All parents need
to develop a balance between their own needs and those of
their children (Silverman in Boerner & Silverman, 2001).
Parents in this study, in their endeavour to be good
parents, are still trying to negotiate how to look after
themselves without neglecting their children. At the moment
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they feel that their children come first. Mr Mathe says
that the best part of being a single parent is being able
to deliver for the children and making sure that everything
in the house is normal as before. Boerner and Silverman
(2001) add that most bereaved parents try to keep the
balance between their own and their children’s needs with
varying degrees of sensitivity and responsiveness to their
children.
Routines and rituals
The four families seem to have adopted new routines or
they have tried to maintain the routines that existed
before the death of the wife and mother. Moriarty and
Wagner (2004, p. 194) define family routines as “symbolic
relationship patterns occurring in meaningful ways among
family members on a consistent basis”. For Marko’s family,
keeping all the rules and developing the ritual where he
and Jannie could talk about Corrie in the evenings before
Jannie went to sleep was very meaningful for both of them.
Marko and Jannie seem to have found solace in the special
time that they created to remember Corrie. Mandla’s family
watched Thato’s 33rd birthday video and that seemed to bring
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all of them together during the time when it was very
painful to think about her death.
McCubbin in Moriarty and Wagner (2004) states the
rituals and routines are used by families as coping
mechanisms during times of stress. McCubbin in Moriarty and
Wagner (2004) further notes the importance and value that
single-parent families attach to these practices to promote
family unity and stability. Mr Mathe felt that it was
important to maintain the status quo in the house and that
everything should remain as normal as before; Marko said
that following routine helped to prevent confusion.
Moriarty and Wagner (2004) remark that as a family evolves,
each ritual has its own unique or sometimes related purpose
of providing structure and instilling certain values or
qualities. Kennedy and Spencer King (1994, p. xi) propose
that the family is
made strong not by the number of heads counted at the
dinner table, but by the rituals that help create the
family, by the memories you share, by the commitment
of time …
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The study of these four widowed single parents’
stories illustrate how the ritual or routine adopted by
their families helped in the coping and maintenance of
homeostasis within the respective families. Single-parent
families are subjected to different sets of stressors and
different exposure to these stressors; however, each family
used rituals as a form of positive adaptation to these
stressors (Moriarty & Wagner, 2004).
Franklin in Simmons (1984, p. 202) says: “Things that
hurt instruct”. The four widowers have experienced
tremendous loss and pain and they have learned from their
experiences. Some days are better than others.
The next chapter discusses the conclusions and
implications of the study. The chapter ends with the
researcher’s reflections of the study and how she was
touched by it.
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CHAPTER 6
CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS
Stereotypical labels often describe single parents as
being irresponsible and negligent with an uncertain future.
It is often deficiency instead of sufficiency which becomes
the focus of single-parent families (Jeter, 1995). This
study has shown that single parenthood can be uplifted to
the level of an archetype.
There is a sense of nobleness in the stories of those
courageous enough to tell the ‘truth’ about their lives and
experience. It was my privilege to witness and listen to
private and sometimes painful expressions of personal
‘truth’. These single fathers were not afraid to expose
their vulnerabilities and struggles. Each widowed single
father’s journey is unique and substantially different from
the others. At the same time, every story suggests similar
dynamics: wanting to be the best parent for their children.
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Table 1: Themes co-occurring within and across the
interviews
MARKO
MATT
MR MATHE
Helplessness
Control and
MANDLA
Helplessness
Connectedness
Isolation
Isolation
and Isolation
versus Support
Closeness
and
Distance
Keeping things
Aiming to be
the same
the best
Protection
‘mother and
mother
Time available
versus time
needed
Disbelief
Responsibility
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Summary of the participants’ meta-themes
•
Adjustment to loss and loneliness
•
Being the best parent
•
Routines and rituals
In summary, these parents moved from the stereotyped role
of single parents who are not coping with parenting to an
archetypal role where they are the best for their families.
These parents and their families moved from loneliness to
reconnection; one parent got advice from his dead wife.
Other parents made use of the support system from their
extended families, church and friends. There was also a
move from single to best parent through keeping things the
same by means of routines. Isolation of the nuclear family
from the extended family assisted some in maintaining
control of their nuclear family and protecting it from
disintegration.
These families progressed from chaos and emptiness to
routines and rituals by keeping and maintaining rules in
their families.
Special times were created where some
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families did things together like watching videos of the
deceased parent together during periods when they felt that
they could not cope with the loss and hurt. Story telling
rituals were also used by some to deal with their loss and
pain. A shift from helplessness to adequacy was facilitated
by managing time available for family and for self. To
compensate for difficulties in coping with the overwhelming
task of doing everything alone, lists of actions were made
to put structure to activities of daily living.
This study focused on the widowers’ experiences of
single parenting. Based on the deficit model of single
parenting, it is assumed that single parents are inadequate
as parents and that children raised by single parents are
mostly delinquents (Dowd, 1997). In Chapter 3, the
literature states that fathers are not capable of caring
for their children and that children need two parents to be
well adjusted. Parsons’ and Bales’ (1956) sex role theory
claims that men’s role in parenting is that of being
financial providers to the family, while mothers are the
nurturers. Men in this study are both providers and
nurturers to their children; although it is a struggle to
combine the two roles, they are doing the best they can.
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The degree of role strain depends on the age of the
children and the amount of outside assistance available.
Younger children require more physical and emotional care.
The father with the youngest child, four years, seemed to
have found a way of dealing with his single father status.
He was the one who was the most supported by family,
friends and the church.
The widowers in this study recognized that their
strength and growth had not eliminated the painful memories
of their lost ones. All four of them said that life had to
go on and they felt that for the sake of their children
they had to be strong. They believe that although they lost
their spouses, they have gained something invaluable, the
special bond with their children.
Children from these families could expect to be cared
for, nurtured, and loved by their fathers. Silverman in
Boerner and Silverman (2001) states that widows and
widowers need to develop a balance between their own needs
and those of their children. Jackson (1987) adds that
fathers who express non-traditional beliefs about parenting
roles felt more competent in their roles as single fathers.
Another aspect that seemed healthy is the extent and
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quality of communication between children and their
fathers. There appeared not to be an issue regarding sexrole identification between fathers and their daughters.
The fathers with girls claim that they have grown closer to
their daughters after the death of their wives. Pedersen
(1981) argues that the traditional theoretical approach to
female and male behaviour has been in terms of a
unidimensional, bipolar construct in which masculinityfemininity is roughly equated with the instrumentalexpressive dimension. Pedersen (1981) further states that
it has been found that men and women are androgynous and
they are more likely to perform cross-sex behaviours; they
are less constrained by sex-role stereotypes. One father
who has been widowed for six years states that he connects
better with his daughter than with the sons and there is an
openness that transcends gender. Lamb (1997) states that
fathers and mothers seem to influence their children in
similar, rather than dissimilar ways.
The characteristics of individual fathers such as
their masculinity, intellect and even their warmth are less
important than the characteristics of the relationships
that they have established with their children (Lamb,
1997). The one father who has been widowed for six months
168
is worried that he might not be able to answer his
daughter’s sexuality questions.
These parents experience role conflict and it becomes
a source of great discomfort. The intensity of role
conflict is related to their feeling responsible to
maintain the ‘status quo’ as one of the fathers claimed.
Their concern for their families drives them to be
‘perfect’ in their new role.
A high priority for these families was the importance
of relationships; all fathers revealed that they needed
others and three of them reached out to others when they
needed help. For these fathers, it is important to have an
open and honest relationship with their children. They
appear to derive pleasure in their interactions with their
children and although available quality time is limited,
they have rituals which bring them together to connect on a
deeper level. These widowers have taken charge of their
lives; they are resilient and determined to make the best
of the situation in which they find themselves.
At the time of the study, none of the fathers was in
therapy and three of them felt that they found healing
169
through interaction with others. These three fathers stated
that the best advice they could give to someone in their
position is that they should make use of the available
support. One said: “as men, we should put pride in our
pockets and ask for help”. Several studies (Burgess, 1995;
Bustanoby, 1985; Greif, 1990; Greif, 1995; MonaghanLeckband, 1978) have shown that widowers get more support
from the extended family than other parents do.
Widowed single parents in this study are motivated to
submit to single parenthood, perhaps due to the positive
sentiments they hold for their children. The negativistic
structural approach to the study of families has
limitations (Bronfenbrenner, 1997; Dowd, 1997; MonaghanLeckband, 1978). Single parents are capable of creating a
cohesive, warm, supportive and favourable environment for
the development of their children (Monaghan-Leckband,
1978).
This study has revealed that widowed single fathers,
while continuing to fill the traditional family role of
providers are also capable of providing tender, loving care
for the emotional and physical needs of their children.
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Implications for single parents
The four widowed single parents in this study showed
that although it is not easy and not without sacrifices,
single parenting is ‘do-able’. (Mendes, 1978; Prater, 1995;
Shireman, 1995) state that single male parents may
experience role strain as they are required to perform both
male and female duties. Monaghan-Leckband, (1978) further
adds that lone parenting poses some challenges, but single
parents are able to adjust and adapt to the new role. These
men are heading families which are functional and they are
not planning to abdicate their duties just because they
sometimes feel like they cannot cope with the
responsibilities of single parenting. They perceive their
families as normal and they perceive themselves as better
than parents in two-parent families.
Monaghan-Leckband (1978) states that the idealization
of the two-parent families has masked both its weaknesses
and the strengths of the single parent family. Dowd (1997)
maintains that the veneration of the nuclear two-parent
family as a core social organization does not reflect the
reality of family structures.
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The development of social norms and values which
support different types of family systems would be
beneficial to the society. Labelling family types different
from the traditional two-parent household as ‘deviant’
appears not to have served any purpose for the singleparent family. Kamerman and Kahn in Dowd (1997) state that
a single-parent family is a euphemism for ‘problem family’
and is perceived as some kind of social pathology.
Studies on single-parent families have focused on
problems encountered by these families and conclusions have
been that single-parent families are dysfunctional, broken,
deviant and problem families (Javo, Ronning, Heyerdahl &
Rudmin 2004; Snyman, 1993). Gongla in Dowd (1997) further
adds that the stigma we attach to single-parent families
most significantly results in the economic and social
isolation of these families. Positive attributes of single
parent families have been ignored due to the stigma that
walls off any recognition of insights exemplified by these
families (Dowd, 1997).
As a single parent, I feel encouraged by the stories
of these parents. I know that being a lone parent is not a
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walk in the park, but that there are advantages —— for
instance, the connection between me and my children is
stronger.
Implications for psychotherapists
It is significant for psychotherapists to understand
and view families as they (these families) perceive
themselves. None of the fathers in this study thought their
families were broken or deviant. In therapy, the therapist
should be aware of his/her preconceived ideas regarding
functional families. A family, as defined by Auerswald
(1990) is a patterned set of connected events in a
relational domain. This means that families should not be
seen in terms of the organization and who is doing what:
rather the question should be how things are done in the
particular family; that is, how who is connecting with
whom.
It is easy for therapists to want to rescue the
single-parent family, thereby becoming a co-parent with the
single parent rather than being a therapist. Especially in
the case of single fathers, female therapists may tend to
take on the mother role when dealing with this family
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because of the absence of the mother. The social
constructionist view of reality is that there is a
multiverse of realities; meaning that how we see families
may be different to how they see themselves.
Limitations of the study
From the second order cybernetics viewpoint we can
never know the ‘truth’ as it is self-referential. As a
researcher, the interpretation of the stories of the four
single fathers was informed partly by my past and by my
prejudices. Social constructionists add that meanings we
construe are not the only constructions that could exist.
Stories of these single fathers represent a slice in time;
what was accurate in the moment of the interview may not be
so today. These are sacred, but historically-limited
moments in the lives of the single fathers interviewed.
Reflections of the researcher
Reflection means interpreting one’s own
interpretations, looking at one’s own perspectives, and
turning a self-critical eye onto one’s own authority as
interpreter and author. Reflection is above all a question
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of recognising fully the ambivalent relation of a
researcher’s text to the realities studied.
This study made me aware how connected we are to
others. I was struck by how I, also a single parent, felt
similar to these fathers at times. I had to constantly
remind myself of how the study touches me and not to impart
my own meanings to their stories. I noted how the flow of
the conversation changed from participant to participant,
influenced by our different personalities and also by my
gaining confidence as I moved towards the end of the
interviews. Listening to the tapes and reading the
transcripts, I became aware how abrupt and context
insensitive I was at times when I did not ask questions
after certain comments that the participants made.
This comment by Dilthey in Simmons (1985, p. 224):
“one discovers himself in the other person” rang true for
me during the process of this study. I discovered myself in
the four widowed single fathers. Their experience sometimes
paralleled mine. When their experiences were different and
their attachment of meaning to that experience differed
from mine, I still learned about myself. I also learned
about myself as a therapist and how important rapport is
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when joining with your clients. With hindsight, I think
that if I were to interview the same participants again, it
would be done differently. I am not saying that I would get
a better story from the participants, but I would ask fewer
leading questions.
As I reflect on the entire process I now realize how
biased the society is regarding single parents in general
and single fathers in particular. These fathers did not
neglect or go into relationships immediately after they
found themselves alone. They are proud single fathers who
are aware of the challenges facing them, but who are not
prepared to abandon their responsibilities towards their
children.
Suggestions for further research
This study supports the findings of other studies
which claim that men are capable of raising children on
their own as single parents. Single-parent family research
is still in its infancy in spite of the fact that these
families are the largest growing family type in this
country. There were few studies of single parents in this
country which were not deficit model oriented. As the
176
traditional two-parent family rapidly disappears in this
country due to AIDS related deaths, it is likely that men
will become increasingly active in child care.
More research is needed on the impact of single
fatherhood on children’s development. It would be
interesting to hear the children’s stories about their
fathers who raised them on their own. The questions to ask
would be: How do children perceive their fathers’
parenting? How would children from these families fare as
adults? Other future studies may include both fathers and
their children to examine differences, if any. It was
obvious to me that these men were in charge of their lives;
they were resilient and determined to survive. This study
indicates, as does the literature on the subject, that
single parents have much positive impact on their children;
that they may be the most significant aspect in their
children’s lives. Yet, I sense that the process is twodirectional and that mutual shaping is going on. How that
happens and what the impact of the child is on the father
would be most interesting to look at.
Although this study was primarily concerned with
single fathers, this does not rule out the need to explore
177
the role of their families of origin in shaping their
attitude towards single parenting.
178
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